Hail Mary Budget betting on divine (resources boom) intervention
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SA’s colourful finance minister Tito Mboweni cracked his customary jokes in a relaxed Presser ahead of today’s Budget Speech. And he hardly missed a beat during the flurry that followed the live tweeting of his obviously embargoed comments by an SABC staffer (a first for “lock-up” which led to the ejection of all SABC personnel).
But deep inside, the former SARB Governor and chairman of some of Africa’s mightiest companies, knows the structuring of South Africa’s books is the gamble of his life. Mboweni deviated from his natural conservatism, throwing away his central banking book. And like his boss Cyril Ramaphosa whose SONA referred to faith and prayers, there’s something of trusting in Providence in Budget 2020.
The combination of corruption, incompetence and excessively powerful trade unions has put South Africa up a financial creek with nary a paddle in sight. Ramaphosa warned us in SONA that the national priority right now is to address the fundamentals. And topping that list is the massive disaster called Eskom.
One day someone will work out the true cost to a nation of the thieves who infested Eskom’s boardroom and seats of operational power. After absorbing the scale of the damage, it should be a national obsession to get the Gupta brothers and their local associates – Pamensky, Essa et al – into orange onesies…
But deep inside, the former SARB Governor and chairman of some of Africa’s mightiest companies, knows the structuring of South Africa’s books is the gamble of his life. Mboweni deviated from his natural conservatism, throwing away his central banking book. And like his boss Cyril Ramaphosa whose SONA referred to faith and prayers, there’s something of trusting in Providence in Budget 2020.
The combination of corruption, incompetence and excessively powerful trade unions has put South Africa up a financial creek with nary a paddle in sight. Ramaphosa warned us in SONA that the national priority right now is to address the fundamentals. And topping that list is the massive disaster called Eskom.
One day someone will work out the true cost to a nation of the thieves who infested Eskom’s boardroom and seats of operational power. After absorbing the scale of the damage, it should be a national obsession to get the Gupta brothers and their local associates – Pamensky, Essa et al – into orange onesies…
