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Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana presents a transformative 2025 Budget featuring gradual VAT increases and significant expenditure adjustments to address South Africa's R5. 69 trillion debt burden. The comprehensive plan includes R232. 6 billion allocation over the medium term, targeting sustainable growth and economic stability.
Cogta Minister Velenkosini Hlabisa assured President Cyril Ramaphosa that the Government of National Unity (GNU) will fulfil his SONA commitments so that the promises can become reality.
This Bill aims to provide for the adjustment of appropriations from the National Revenue Fund to cater to the state's financial needs for the 2024/2025 fiscal period.
‘The Minister of Finance is faced with an unenviable challenge: balancing the unaffordability of these increases with the risk of a strike. ’
Last week, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana warned that South Africa’s debt has risen too fast and too high - currently R5. 2 trillion, and the country has to manage its debt more effectively.
Cosatu said the public sector is not bloated - in 1994 there was 1 million public servants for 34 million citizens compared to the current 1. 2 million workers to cater for 64 million citizens
Cosatu and workers had expected much more from the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement tabled at Parliament on Wednesday.
Quinton Mtyala writes that the 2024 Medium Term Budget Policy Statement, presented last Wednesday, underscores South Africa’s precarious fiscal position.
Cosatu demands enhanced fiscal support for state-owned enterprises to combat South Africa's pressing issues of poverty, unemployment, and inequality, following the recent Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement.
For a country like South Africa with a legacy of deep-rooted inequalities that haunt marginalised communities, education remains a powerful tool to achieve equality.
South Africa's 2024 Medium Budget Policy Statement reveals promising steps towards economic recovery, with experts highlighting positive developments in infrastructure investment and job creation, despite ongoing debt challenges.
This is the time for progressive forces to come together and fight against a privatisation agenda that seeks to place state-owned entities in direct competition with a private sector that is solely interested in profit, says the writer.
The Minister said the Department of Communications and Digital Technologies should rather reprioritise its budget to fund the SA Post Office.
Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana's first MTBPS under the GNU presents a balanced approach to tackling South Africa's economic challenges, emphasising investment-led growth while maintaining fiscal discipline.
Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana has tabled Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement, here’s what South Africans should know about what happens next.
Government remains committed to achieving debt-stabilising primary budget surpluses.
Education budget problems self-inflicted, says Godongwana.
Major funding shifts are not expected in the 2025 medium-term expenditure framework period as the focus will be on developing systems and mechanisms that support this reform, as outlined in the NHI Act of 2023.
Several members of the media wanted to know how the budgeting process would work now that the Government of National Unity (GNU) contained ten parties, each with its own agenda.
At the heart of South Africa’s economic aspirations lies Operation Vulindlela, a strategic initiative aimed at enhancing productivity and competitiveness.
The government is considering ways to reform social grants and consolidate public employment initiatives to cater for the unemployed.
An increase in the remuneration of an already bloated Cabinet, lack of details around how the country will tackle corruption, and government debt, were some of the concerns raised.
South Africa’s average spending on public-sector salaries is well above that of many countries, with the general government wage bill constituting 13. 6% of the GDP in 2022 - the third highest in the world after Iceland and Denmark, according to the OECD - while the general government employment was the seventh at 18. 6%.
That the minister acknowledged South Africa’s challenges but missed the opportunity to ignite confidence was echoed by the performance in the rand.
“South Africa’s average spending on public sector salaries is well above that of many countries,” the MTBPS document noted.