SACP
*South African Communist Party, 25 October 2012*** *SACP Statement on the Medium Term Budget Policy Statement*The SACP commends the Minister of Finance, cde Pravin Gordhan and his team for their positive Medium Term Budget Policy Statement and Medium Term Expenditure Framework. Cde Gordhan was not faced with an easy task this year, in the context of a persisting global capitalist crisis and recent domestic challenges. The most critical feature of this year's MTBPS is that, unlike in many other countries buffeted by the global crisis, government has clearly chosen not to pursue a right-wing austerity package. This is (in the Minister's words) "definitely not about fiscal austerity."
While there are no upward adjustments in the 2012/13 budget announced at the beginning of this year, today's Policy Statement re-affirms the public sector commitment to a R845bn three-year spend on the integrated infrastructure roll-out, a continued commitment to the manufacturing sector, and to an expanding social wage (education, health-care, human settlements and social infrastructure, public transport and social grants).
Amongst its many positive features, the SACP welcomes the announcement that there will soon be progress in the establishment of a Chief Procurement Officer in government. This office will be responsible for introducing much greater coordination and probity in procurement across government - currently a major source of irregularity, waste, and often corruption
Today's Policy Statement is clearly aligned with the important recommendations from last week's Presidential High Level meeting involving government, organized labour and business, and the community sector, as well as last week's Presidential Infrastructure Investment Conference. Taken together, these government-led national-wide initiatives provide a robust rejection of the chorus of doomsday pessimists seeking to present SA as "leaderless" and "rudderless". Today's MTBPS, like last week's presidential summits, underlines the complementary nature of the National Development Plan, the New Growth Path, the Industrial Policy Action Programme, and the Presidential Infrastructure Coordinating Commission. This will give no joy to those opportunists who constantly seek to drive wedges within government in order to advance their own narrow class interests.
Of course, both today's Policy Statement and the various recommendations from last week's presidential summits will require a collective effort and vigilance in government and from organized labour and popular formations on the ground. The SACP pledges to work constructively in ensuring that, even in the midst of a persisting global capitalist crisis, we place our society onto a substantially different, labour intensive and more egalitarian growth path.
*Issued by the SACP****** ****** **_Contact_**:****** ****** **Malesela Maleka****** **SACP Spokesperson -- 082 226 1802 ** *** -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] .
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