Johannesburg - Mmusi Maimane – leader of One SA Movement – urged President Cyril Ramaphosa to reveal urgent measures to fight Covid-19 related corruption cases and to bring stability in schools in his State of the Nation Address on Thursday.
Maimane was addressing a virtual media conference in Cape Town on Wednesday when he detailed his civil society organisation’s wish list for Ramaphosa.
According to Maimane, his appeal to Ramaphosa is a combination of inputs from various people in the country who are concerned about the levels of corruption and the poor state of schooling in the country.
“In President Ramaphosa’s previous four SONA’s, he has followed his predecessor’s example, skimming over the deep structural challenges, and instead, rolling out lofty promises and commitments that are out of touch with both reality and the general populous.
“Since 2018, President Ramaphosa has made many commitments, promises and signals of intent. However, when you run the numbers, he has fallen short of the vast majority. Some of the promises include: “At the centre of our national agenda in 2018 is the creation of jobs, especially for the youth.” Three years later, and youth unemployment is at almost 60%.” Maimane said.
He also said that Ramaphosa promised that “these SOEs cannot borrow their way out of their financial difficulties, and we will, therefore, undertake a process of consultation with all stakeholders to review the funding model of SOEs and other measures.”
Maimane further highlighted that the government has handed the ailing South African Airways (SAA) yet another bailout – this time at over R10 billion adding that the President had promised that the Accelerated School Infrastructure Delivery Initiative programme would complete all outstanding projects by the end of the next financial year.
He maintained that to date, over 3 000 schools still are without running water and 4 000 pit toilets were used by learners across the country.
On health matters, Maimaine said Ramaphosa had previously mentioned that government had embarked on a Presidential Health Summit. "Here the participants dissected the crisis in the health system and proposed immediate, short term and medium-term solutions to improve the effectiveness of the health system.”
According to Maimane, the Covid-19 pandemic has shown that SA’s health system is on its knees with rampant corruption, mismanagement and underfunding despite Ramaphosa’s earlier promise that his administration would work with the NPA and other agencies of law enforcement to develop a more enduring solution to deal with corruption.
Political Bureau