DA:Ramaphosa's economic plan will only work through implementation

Ramaphosa will address a joint sitting of Parliament on Thursday afternoon to outline South Africa’s economic reconstruction and recovery plan.

But the DA's interim leader John Steenhuisen believes Ramaphosa has no proper plan to get the economy moving.

"Ramaphosa has run out of road for plans and promises. Now we need action and results. If this plan fails on implementation, it will go down in history as his Economic Destruction Inaction Plan and his presidency will mark the biggest ever sustained contraction of South Africa’s economy," says Steenhuisen.

He says the economy will only recover if government implements urgent issues such as reforming the energy sector.

"The plan contains many insincere commitments that the government has no intention of acting on. ‘Building a capable state', for example, isn’t worth the ink it’s written with until the ANC commits to ending their policy of cadre deployment that hollowed out the state in the first place.

"And then there are some major gaps, such as a failure to commit to liquidating SAA and to a clear roadmap to debt stabilisation."

Steenhuisen says the plan needs real and rapid implementation of the big-ticket structural reforms promised.

" Our future, and President Ramaphosa’s legacy, is at stake.

"The president has long and often promised pro-growth reforms, and he must be held to account for these commitments. Endless plans and empty rhetoric are not going to cut it. Implementation is all that counts now."

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