Getting SA back to basics
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There are a lot of things wrong with South Africa and our imperfect democracy. But one sometimes get the feeling in our haste to point them out we forget that other, far more advanced and established democracies, are stumbling more than we are through this Covid crisis.
We know the problems well because the doomsayers derive an almost nihilistic pleasure from repeatedly pointing them out, that is perhaps more a confirmation of their own confirmation biases.
Some say nthe politics is broken and riven with factionalism a broad church that won’t be able to self-correct because to do so would risk tearing the broad church apart. And that is why we cannot confront the difficult economic and social reform choices we have to make, like placing the right people in charge of delivering basic services at local government, rooting out corruption and cutting lose the vampire squid of the failing SOEs that drain the life out of the economy.
But the reality, if one bothers to cut through an often overly simplistic narrative, is far removed from that and one wonders how we all as leaders in business and in whatever role we find ourselves give enough thought to the constraints in the political economy.
Both the President’s and the Finance Minister’s statements have made it clear that the chosen path is structural reform – making changes in the economy to improve productivity and longer-term growth. Growth salvation will not come from the Budget, but from structural reforms in the real economy. Boring and not headline-catching, but real.
In fact, general criticism about the Recovery Plan was that it is nothing new. Precisely. No easy money, no new policies – just working to improve the basics. When parliamentarians denounced that the plan is a repeat of old ideas, the President conceded.
Michael Avery hosted a roundtable with Prof Nick Binedell, still doing work for the PPG
We know the problems well because the doomsayers derive an almost nihilistic pleasure from repeatedly pointing them out, that is perhaps more a confirmation of their own confirmation biases.
Some say nthe politics is broken and riven with factionalism a broad church that won’t be able to self-correct because to do so would risk tearing the broad church apart. And that is why we cannot confront the difficult economic and social reform choices we have to make, like placing the right people in charge of delivering basic services at local government, rooting out corruption and cutting lose the vampire squid of the failing SOEs that drain the life out of the economy.
But the reality, if one bothers to cut through an often overly simplistic narrative, is far removed from that and one wonders how we all as leaders in business and in whatever role we find ourselves give enough thought to the constraints in the political economy.
Both the President’s and the Finance Minister’s statements have made it clear that the chosen path is structural reform – making changes in the economy to improve productivity and longer-term growth. Growth salvation will not come from the Budget, but from structural reforms in the real economy. Boring and not headline-catching, but real.
In fact, general criticism about the Recovery Plan was that it is nothing new. Precisely. No easy money, no new policies – just working to improve the basics. When parliamentarians denounced that the plan is a repeat of old ideas, the President conceded.
Michael Avery hosted a roundtable with Prof Nick Binedell, still doing work for the PPG