Honourable Speaker,
We cannot afford to continue to bailout our failing SOEs.
SAA is in trouble and we all know it. Debt is too deep, revenue growth is too weak, procurement problems are costing us too much.
There is simply too many costs and not enough income.
All households in South Africa know this problem.
We cannot keep adding to South Africans costs by raising VAT and fuel levies to pay for corruption and mismanagement.
The rot must stop.
The tens of billions sunk in to SAA have not yielded a profit or dividends for our country.
Like Eskom, SAA has weakened the country by sucking up valuable funds we should have been using for service delivery, housing, and investment in growth-enabling infrastructure.
Honourable Speaker,
GOOD believes that SOE’s must be financially independent from government and we will support anyone who can turnaround the ailing SAA and stop the need for bailouts.
SOEs must be run efficiently and professionally so that they yield dividends. We need those dividends and profits to be used for the benefit of all South Africans so that we can invest more for South Africa.
– We need more budget to ensure that social grants keep pace with inflation;
– We need more investment in critical social services like education, policing and healthcare; and
– We need more investment in infrastructure that stimulates growth and job creation.
Honourable Speaker.
The argument that state owned entities in the developmental state serve interests beyond profitability cannot be used to justify destroying the economy.
GOOD is pleased that management and the unions have reached an agreement to work together.
It is time to FIX SAA so that we can Fix SA.