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Cape Town - President Jacob Zuma came under fire in the top comment for the week as he shared his enthusiasm about the economy with South Africa.
While the president was upbeat on the economy, opposition leader Mmusi Maimane proposed a 5-point plan to salvage the economy.
In the top comment Fin24 commentator Warren Webb blasted Zuma for stimulating the economy in the wrong way.
Maimane's 5-point salvage proposal was mostly well received in the comments section, although some had reservations.
Commentator Caswell Bjalane was flummoxed by the latter's plan to "do away with sections of Labour Relations Act that give unions...powers".
Below is the weekly dose of top ten Fin24 user comments - selected for their wit, value-add to the topic at hand and contribution to healthy debate in a country so much in need of constructive dialogue.
Top ten user comments on:
Zuma upbeat on economy, electricity supply:
1. Warren Webb - [President] Zuma has created 6 million new jobs as promised...2 million more entrepreneurial car guards, 1 million more traffic light jockeys selling stuff nobody wants (who buys sun glasses at traffic lights anyway...), 1.2 million government employees with extra part-time jobs looting and corrupting the government kitty...500 000 more resourceful career criminals lawlessly riding around hijacking motorists, attacking innocent residents in their houses, killing cops, blowing up ATM's, attacking people in malls, and the rest are lawless taxi drivers breaking every imaginable road rule and endangering the life of motorists...
Commission to police BEE fronting:
2. Heinrich Venter - How about a commission to look into 'BEE' companies receiving tenders without having any relevant business experience nor the required skills to actually service the tender?
Eskom seeks to recoup R38bn through tariff hikes:
3. Stand4Truth - So Eskom says that the solution is that people who aren't paying at the current price will all of a sudden start paying at the new higher price? Seems more like Eskom is trying to screw the few people who are paying because that is the only way to get more money. Why not screw the people who are not paying for a change? Aah, but we all know that will never happen as that will screw with the ANC's voter base. Eskom you guys are three bars short of full signal!
Maimane's 5-point plan to salvage SA economy:
4. Caswell Bjalane - A Man with a 5-point plan to "do away with sections of Labour Relations Act that give unions...powers". Really? Is this man on a plan for the 'revitilisation of minority power' to reverse SA into exploitative labour laws where unions were silenced and workers treated as slaves as it was before? He must be sick! He needs help.
5. Anton Martin - The only way we can achieve a more equal society is through economic INTEGRATION. redistribution will not succeed because it will destroy wealth in the process. Economic integration can only happen if the government focuses it's energy on creating a bigger and stronger black middle class. That is why the DA wants to: 1) stimulate small businesses by cutting red tape 2) create youth entrepreneur programmes (like the 80 hubs that they have built in places like Khayelitsha) so that more young black people can start their own businesses and 3) introduce a youth wage subsidy to make it more viable for companies to employ young black people so that they can get the skills they need.
Not all SOEs performing badly – Ramaphosa:
6. Anton Martin - They also have a very strong culture of social responsibility going back thousands of years. In China it is not uncommon for people to die from being overworked. They will literally work themselves to death in order to live up to social responsibility ethics.
IDC focuses on boosting black industrialists:
7. Daniel Cilliers - This IDC policy is discriminating against poor black people. Surely supporting industrialists with best ability to create jobs is the right thing to do. The racist policy of the IDC is blatantly disingenuous and to the detriment of black people desperate for jobs.
8. Winston Mayweather - IDC is for mega projects, this is an encouragement to blacks to think and play big. Tired of blacks running chesa-nyama business.
Jobs crisis: Can this task team cut it?
9. Isaac Newtonian - Look at how few jobs are being created, meanwhile we live in the largest welfare state on earth! 16 million people on welfare vs 5 million taxpayers. What do people on welfare spend their welfare money on? Food - most of our food is imported. Clothes - most of our clothes are imported. With our level of welfare money, hundreds of billions of rands, we are supporting overseas factories and jobs, when we really need far better economic and business plans to produce far better products and services. SA needs to create a far better environment to do business in.
Eskom seeks to recoup R38bn through tariff hikes:
10. Richard Young - All comes down to management. Imagine if electricity supply was not monopolised and was private. A private company cannot simply raise their prices to expect higher revenue. If they did then they'd lose customers to competitors. End of the day it comes down to management. Extravagant parties and bonuses for non performances, outstanding payments from municipalities and Soweto effectively getting free electricity at the expense of every paying customer. Projects such as Madupi with ever increasing over inflated costs and R200m nuclear waste deal. Management need to start working for their salaries.
Disclaimer: All letters and comments published in MyFin24 have been independently written by members of the Fin24 community. The views are therefore their own and do not necessarily represent those of Fin24.
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