By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
President Cyril Ramaphosa’s speech came under fire in Parliament on Monday during the debate on the State of the Nation Address.
EFF leader Julius Malema launched an attack on Ramaphosa’s speech, saying he was off the mark when he said government does not create jobs, but the private sector is doing it.
“When faced with the problem of white poverty and crisis, the apartheid government used the state to create opportunities and almost completely eradicated joblessness and poverty amongst white people. Today, they say government can’t create jobs. It must be the private sector, “said Malema.
“But we know during apartheid, they established state-owned institutions with the aim and purposes of employing white people,” he said.
“The poverty and joblessness is getting worse under the current administration, with more than 1.7 million people who were previously employed losing jobs and the majority if not all these jobs were in the private sector, which we are told can create jobs. Despite this basic verifiable statistic, the president of the former liberation movement comes here and say that government does not create jobs and the hopeless people of our people must wait for the private sector to create jobs for them. Sending our people to the private sector for jobs is like sending cattle to the slaughter,” said Malema.
Malema said Ramaphosa’s presidency had been characterised by indecisive leadership and an alleged push by government to privatise the country’s struggling state-owned enterprises.
This was after Ramaphosa last Thursday said 80% of jobs in the country were created by the private sector. He said the government creates an enabling environment for jobs.
Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele hit back and said Ramaphosa’s speech was not what opposition parties were interpreting it to be.
Gungubele said they did not want to be diverted from the main message of what Ramaphosa said on Thursday.
“We stand to be diverted to spend time facts from ideas. We have known our philosophy of a mixed economy. We won’t repeat it here, “said Gungubele.
Meanwhile the DA has tabled a motion of no-confidence against the country’s entire Cabinet. During the Sona 2022 debate, DA leader John Steenhuisen tore into Ramaphosa over his poor-performing ministers.
Steenhuisen said Ramaphosa admitted that he puts the ANC ahead of the country, which is why he cannot bring himself to fire any of the party members who fail in their portfolios.
“Instead of cleaning out your cabinet you simply reshuffle the inept and the corrupt, again and again, until every single ministry has the grubby fingerprints of failure all over it,” said Steenhuisen.
Steenhuisen said Ramaphosa has a chance to rewrite his presidency by allowing the DA to help him fire his comrades.
Police Minister Bheki Cele says EFF leader Julius Malema tried to hatch a plot with national police commissioner Khehla Sitole to have him removed from his position.
Cele said Malema met with Sitole on 10 December 2020 in Pretoria, where “the plot was hashed that I [Cele] must be changed”.
“It is not a surprise he [Malema] comes here and changes a Cabinet he does not have. The Honourable Malema will have to wait, win an election, have a Cabinet and appoint the Cabinet,” he added.
EFF chief whip Floyd Shivambu objected, saying Cele “cast aspersions on the Honourable Malema, the commander-in-chief”.
“He must, of course, be removed because he is useless,” added Shivambu to which ANC MP Bheki Radebe objected, saying it was “offence language” to call a minister “useless”.
Deputy Speaker Lechesa Tsenoli said Shivambu had raised a point of order and then broke the rules himself.
Malema then added Cele must repeat his statement outside Parliament, where he is not protected by parliamentary privilege.
“I will repeat it on Friday at 12 when I give the crime stats,” an unperturbed Cele retorted.
Livestream Video Below:
Video Courtesy of Parliament.