In case you missed it, the 2024 electioneering campaign is under way. A hallmark of this pre-election season has been a raft of promises, smacking of costly policy adventurism on all sides of the spectrum.
A fortnight ago the DA, the official opposition, pledged to save the poor not by growing the economy, its long-standing mantra, but by increasing social grants.
Under a DA national administration, the child support grant would increase from R500 to R624; cash payouts would be made to the unemployed; and, interestingly, it would cut taxes to enable South Africans to afford essential food items.
The motivation for these measures is the ANC’s mismanagement over the years. No mention is made of the fact that the ANC, with its countless policy disasters, has been successful in at least one thing: it has averted a humanitarian disaster by extending the social welfare system.
During the Covid-19 pandemic it failed dismally on many socioeconomic relief measures such as uplifting the poor from congested informal settlements and building more healthcare facilities. Instead, the Gauteng government ordered the excavation of thousands of empty graves in anticipation of mass deaths.
Fortunately, blessed by tax revenue windfall from commodity miners, it did succeed in using the bonanza to top up social grants, and it even introduced a special social distress grant — the Covid-19 grant — meant for any South African who doesn’t receive any of the many grants such as old age, disability or child support grant. This grant, which is in place until next March at least, swelled the ranks of grant recipients as fewer people returned to employment after the end of the pandemic.
By all indications, the Covid-19 grant is going nowhere. President Cyril Ramaphosa appears to have given up on the aspiration of growing the economy. Instead, he is seriously toying with the idea of introducing a basic income grant.
As well as negotiating the national minimum wage, he believes, the basic income grant would cement his legacy as a consequential president.
Also, in the recent few weeks, having failed to pass the catastrophic land expropriation without compensation law, Ramaphosa’s administration has been pushing other populist measures.
Two stand out: the employment equity amendment and the National Health Insurance. His administration has turned a deaf ear to dire warnings of what would happen to the country’s ailing health system if the NHI was imposed.
Both pieces of legislation are now facing costly and protracted litigation.
On July 29, Julius Malema’s EFF will celebrate their 10th anniversary with a new set of populist policy proposals ahead of the 2024 general election in which the ANC may fall below 51% required to form a national government.
Ordinarily, there would be nothing wrong with new ideas, even bad ones. In fact, any debate is welcome given the serious nature of the problems we face. What is wrong, however, is that these pipe dreams are not costed or supported by any evidence of potential success other than wooing voters. This newspaper urges voters to ask to see the costs and funding proposals for these lofty ideas.
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