‘Not as bad as I feared; perhaps even better than I hoped’ – is my reply to the question implicit in the title.
I have been flat-out covering the event for paying clients and I was at parliament in the gracious hands of the lovely people from Radio 2000 – where I commented for about an hour. Hence me only scribbling these short notes at this late stage in proceedings.
View from before
This is what I had to say before the event:
It is a ceremonial occasion; Jacob Zuma is there in his capacity as Head of State (not only head of government); it’s a joint sitting of the National Assembly and the National Council of Provinces; the Executive, the Legislature and the Judiciary is in formal attendance; there’s a red carpet, a twenty-one gun salute and a public gallery packed with ordinary people, senior representatives of the governing alliance and foreign and local dignitaries … this is just not a place where policy decisions, especially the various nettles Jacob Zuma will be required to grasp, could be spoken of in the clear and forthright terms that will, ultimately, be required.
View from the moment
I was initially very positive.
After a ten minute glance at the document I said to Reuters:
With surprising fluency Jacob Zuma managed to sound like a head of state dealing with an emergency – the crisis of unemployment. He didn’t grasp the nettle of the regulations that are strangling the labour market, but he placed more emphasis than expected on the private sector – especially manufacturing. There was also more detail than expected – and a confirmation that the interventionist aspects of the NGP will be issues to be dealt with this year.
I was impressed by the details namely:
- The nugget at the core of the speech: the proposed R20 billion in tax breaks for manufacturing investments above R200 million for new projects and R30 million for expansions and upgrades – I do not expect the ANC’s trade union allies to be charmed by this idea (money in the hands of the bosses!) even if they will be amongst the ultimate beneficiaries.
- Significant (and part of the New Growth Path’s underlying strategy of fiscal constraint and monetary easing) he foregrounded the statement that: “The Budget deficit is set to decline from the current 6.7% to between 3 and 4% by 2013. Concerns about the exchange rate have been taken to heart”.
- The R9 billion by 2013 “jobs fund” – what is interesting about this is apparently Helen Zille interpreted this on an SAFM interview as the long-lost subsidy for first time youth workers … Cosatu is also going to hate that implicit segmentation of the labour market. ’
View from today?
I’m still positive. There was lots of ra! ra! in there, but that is to be expected in an election year and, quite frankly, every victory he claimed he said how far we still have to go.
He also spoke surprisingly like a statesman and he made the drive for jobs sound like a clarion call to mobilise the nation for war … which this campaign is or should be.
Finally, he mentioned that the Municipal elections will take place before the end of May. That will be enough grist for me mill … heady times to be a political analyst in this country.
Nic Borain 