GOOD Statement by Brett Herron,
GOOD Secretary-General & Member of Parliament
8 February 2022
• IMPLEMENT BASIC INCOME GRANT
• SUBSIDISE OR UNDERWRITE SOLAR POWER FOR DOMESTIC USERS
• LEGISLATION TO PROTECT MUNICIPAL SERVICE DELIVERY FROM COALITION MUSICAL CHAIRS
Six years ago, when President Ramaphosa delivered his inaugural State of the Nation Address, his Thuma Mina tune of reform and renewal breathed new hope into a nation that had lost Billions to corruption, and with it, dollops of pride and self-esteem.
Now, as we battle to provide answers for extreme and unsustainable levels of poverty, struggle to focus in Eskom’s increasing output of darkness, and watch the politics of unsustainable and unprincipled coalitions destroy many of our municipalities, the tune feels corny because its promise hasn’t been fulfilled.
The President has the power to begin to turn the nation’s mood around, and GOOD calls on him to use this power by announcing three real commitments in this year’s SONA:
Prioritise Relief For The Most Economically Disadvantaged Citizens By Implementing A Basic Income Grant
The President himself spoke of the impact of the R350 Covid grant on entrepreneurship last year, when he referred to the ice-cream shop. The R350 is not good enough. The World Bank argued in 2021 that if South Africa matched the self-employment rates of countries such as Mexico, Turkey and Brazil, we’d halve the unemployment figure.
Prioritise The Electricity Crisis
Share the State’s urgent and implementable plan to stop loadshedding (a State of Disaster is not a plan to stop loadshedding) and give consumers an immediate break by assisting them to acquire solar power.
For the past month or two, members of the executive have provided different time-frames and methodologies by which they say South Africa will overcome loadshedding. What’s the truth? How are we going to do it, and when? Why should long-suffering electricity consumers believe the plan this time, when previous promises have just delivered more loadshedding?
The President must also use his power to make a just energy transition real for ordinary electricity consumers by providing State backing for the affordable implementation of solar energy.
This scheme, too, should prioritise subsidized relief for poorer households, while perhaps underwriting loan schemes for those households who can afford to pay affordable rates.
The Property Assessed Clean Energy model already exists for financing energy efficiency and renewable energy improvements on private property.
Prioritise Stabilising Municipalities
Coalition politics looks like it is here to stay. Without measures to stabilise coalition governments, the instability we’re presently seeing in Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni, Durban and many other municipalities will be replicated across the nation.
Other countries, more experienced than ours in coalition politics, have developed rules to mitigate the instability of constant manoeuvring and musical chairs.
Among them are that duly appointed mayor’s serve their full terms, regardless of coalition movements, and that the party that attains the most votes in the election has the first opportunity to form a government.
What we presently have is a recipe for instability, for coalitions to be formed not on principle but on political opportunity, and for service delivery to become an afterthought. The President has the power to lead us out of this dead-end.
Media Enquiries:
Brett Herron, GOOD Secretary-General & Member of Parliament
Cell: 0825183264
Email: bretth@forgood.org.za
Janke Tolmay, GOOD Media Manager
Cell: 0733671223
Email: janke@forgood.org.za