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With concerns over austerity and economic inequality, South Africa’s major labour unions rally against the proposed VAT increase and call for pro-worker reforms.
Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana today tables the 2025 budget – amid an expected unified march by labour and concerns by the Financial and Fiscal Commission (FFC), which has expressed unhappiness about the process followed.
FFC chair Dr Patience Nombeko Mbava decried the “absence in undertaking this mandatory and legislated consultation process” including “missing information, which is a procedurally irregular budget process.”
In an unprecedented political hurdle, the ANC had to face, Godongwana’s speech was last month abruptly rescheduled, due to a disagreement with major GNU partner the DA, over the proposed 2% valued-added tax (VAT) increase – a concern shared by labour and organs of civil society.
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The Congress of South African Trade (Cosatu) said it would be marching with the SA Federation of Trade Unions (Saftu) – in a push for a pro-poor budget.
Cosatu national spokesperson Matthew Parks said: “We cannot afford a return to the brutal austerity budget cuts, inspired by a misplaced belief in neo-liberalism, that has crippled frontline public service, upon which the working class relies to survive.”
Cosatu called on government to ramp up support for Eskom, to ensure an end to load shedding; return Transnet and Metro Rail to full productivity; stabilise dysfunctional municipalities; provide services in education, law enforcement, health and home affairs and provide relief for the unemployed by protecting the social relief of distress grant.
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General secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said Saftu “strongly condemns the National Treasury and SA Reserve Bank’s continued pursuit of extreme neoliberal policies, which have deepened austerity and economic inequality”.
“The ANC’s alliance with the DA in the GNU, has exacerbated the problem, as seen in the finance minister’s failed 19 February budget proposal, which sought to impose a 2% VAT increase.”
The Federation of Unions of South Africa general secretary Rifdah Ajam said they approached the budget with “unwavering resolve, demanding bold, worker-centred interventions, to counteract economic stagnation, social distress and corporate greed”.
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