President Cyril Ramaphosa answered economic questions in the National Council of Provinces on Tuesday afternoon.
Here are five key takeaways.
- The terms of multi-billion rand loans by Chinese state banks to power utility Eskom and state port and rail company Transnet will not be made public because of confidentially clauses, said Ramaphosa. The president added this was normal practice, and there was no chance that SA state-owned companies would be taken over.
- Government was working to make sure that boards of state-owned companies could no longer be involved in tenders and procurement. He said in the past board members at some state firms became involved in the awarding of tenders. "It is not the right thing to do," he said.
- A framework for lifestyle audits of top government officials - which Ramaphosa promised during his State of the Nation Address - would be ready by the end of October. Ramaphosa did not give an official date for when the audits would kick off, saying a "robust" framework had to first be developed. High ranking officials in the executive would then have to go through the lifestyle audit process.
- Ramaphosa, defended the decision to get into a loan agreement with China, saying the loans which Eskom and Transnet secured from the China Development Bank facility were more competitive than the global market rate.
- Asked about the response of some western economies to South Africa's plans to allow for the expropriation of land without compensation, Ramaphosa said government had no reason to believe that any country would impose sanctions for any actions that are constitutional, lawful and consistent with international law.
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