Political leaders divided over Finance Minister Godongwana’s budget statement, balancing debt control with unmet priorities on jobs, crime, and inequality.
Political leaders are split on Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement (MTBPS), with responses ranging from praise for fiscal responsibility to critiques of unmet priorities.
Democratic Alliance (DA) leader John Steenhuisen said the Medium-Term Budget Policy Statement (MTBPS) was a collective reflection of priorities of the government of national unity (GNU) and a good precursor to the medium-term development plan that will come out in January.
“I commend Mr Godongwana for the right diagnosis, but now he’s also giving us the right remedy for that diagnosis, and I’m very excited about us taking these first tentative steps on a new path of fiscal responsibility and hopefully growth and jobs for South Africans thereafter,” Steenhuisen said.
Government debt remains a headache for the minister, and he said debt has …