Godongwana's Budget 3.0: Prioritising the Poor Over Executive Privilege

Zamikhaya Maseti 

Isukile kwakhona! Here we go once again! 

ON Wednesday, we will witness yet another high-stakes performance in the great theatre of democratic budgeting, as Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana presents his third version of the 2025 Budget Vote. But make no mistake, this is no ordinary fiscal recital. It follows a bruising, bare-knuckled political brawl that left the ANC staggering, bloodied, and ideologically disoriented.

At the core of the fracas? A deceptively modest proposal: a 0.5% increase in Value-Added Tax (VAT). But the storm it unleashed was anything but minor. What began as a technical adjustment soon morphed into a political reckoning, a fierce and public reckoning over the soul of the post-apartheid State and its commitment to the poor.

In a twist that defied South Africa's familiar ideological geography, the proposed VAT hike galvanised strange bedfellows. Opposition forces, led with surprising agility and populist verve by the Democratic Alliance (DA) and Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), marshalled a political fight that wittingly reframed the ANC as anti-poor. What was once the champion of the downtrodden now stood accused of turning the screws on township tables and subsistence counters.

 The ANC, caught flat-footed, first doubled down, perhaps misjudging the moment's mood. Then came the late and unceremonious U-turn. A retreat, yes. But more than that: an admission of strategic miscalculation, an ideological dislocation, a movement groping for its moral compass.

One cannot help but reflect on this episode as part of a larger political unravelling, where the once ironclad bond between the ANC and its working-class base appears frayed, if not severed. The ANC now limps into the Budget Vote with a nosebleed, not fatal, but revealing. 

The confidence of old has been replaced with tactical hedging, the decisiveness of revolution substituted by the fumbling of technocrats. The wound is fresh. Whether it festers or heals will depend on more than budget lines. It will rest on the Party’s willingness to reflect, self-correct, renew, and reconnect with its traditional base.

This time, the Budget will not land softly. It will fall into a land already bruised, economically fatigued, politically anxious, and socially volatile. When Minister Godongwana steps up to the podium on Wednesday, he will do so against a stark and sobering backdrop: a national unemployment rate of 32.9% in the First Quarter of 2025, and approximately 8.2 million South Africans are without work. 4.8 million of them are young people. 

This is not just a fiscal context, as Treasury officials might put it in their briefings. Minister Godongwana cannot balance this budget by balancing away the youth. He cannot quote GDP forecasts while dodging the gaze of a generation that has waited too long for opportunities that never came. Budgeting, in this climate, is no longer technocratic. It is ethical. It is about whose hopes get funded and whose futures get deferred. The choice is now elemental: either a budget for growth with inclusion, or a budget that fuels exclusion without end. The 2025 Budget Vote must be a moment of reckoning: no more slogans.

 I suppose, as we reflect on the high rate of unemployment and what the 2025 Budget Vote has in store for us as a Nation, we must ask ourselves some unpalatable questions. 

The first question that comes to mind is whether the trust deficit between the Private Sector and the Government, especially after 29 May 2024, is still real or merely perceived. Why do we continue to face such a high unemployment rate if the South African Government and the Private Sector are supposedly singing from the same hymn book when it comes to our development trajectory? 

What is it that we, as South Africans, are not doing enough to grow the South African economy? I raise these questions precisely because I do not want us to look at the high rate of unemployment and instinctively blame the government or expect Minister Godongwana to table “instant coffee” economic solutions this coming Wednesday. Let us self-reflect and have a genuine, honest conversation, as a people, about our role, our effort, and our shared accountability.

The time has come to confront yet another sacred cow in our economic discourse, the dogma of the market fundamentalists who declare with theological certainty that “it is not the business of government to do business.” In their hymn book, the state must step aside, clear the regulatory path, and create a “conducive environment” for business to thrive.

And so, we ask: Has the South African government not done what was asked of it? Over the past decade, successive administrations have bent backwards to accommodate investment. Policy reforms have been enacted. Infrastructure has been prioritised. Institutions have been rebuilt. And let us not forget the flagship South African Investment Conferences, which since inception have mobilised R1.14 trillion in investment pledges. Government data tells us that R460 billion of this has already been committed on the ground, building new factories, acquiring new equipment, and laying down roads.

Yes, these are not promises; they are concrete inputs into the economy. These are not theoretical models; they are brick-and-mortar realities. The question then is not whether the government has created a conducive environment. It has. The question is: why do jobs not follow?

Why, despite all the pledges and ribbon-cuttings, do the queues outside labour centres grow longer? Could it be that the Capital has become too comfortable extracting returns without redistributing opportunities? Could it be that "conducive" is now code for “minimal wages, no transformation, and tax breaks”

We do not raise these questions to inflame. We raise them because a Nation that no longer questions itself has already accepted decline as destiny. And I am quite certain, utterly convinced, that if we confront these hard questions with diligence, courage, and good faith, we will find one another. The bridges between the State and Capital are not broken beyond repair, they are merely unmanned.

Yes, the path to recovery demands reciprocal trade-offs. Not symbolic gestures, but real, measurable commitments. If the private sector is to step up, to invest, to hire, to build, then the state must lead by example. That begins with discipline. With integrity. With a ruthless commitment to cutting the fat that weighs down the people’s hope.

The Government of National Unity (GNU), bold as it is in aspiration, must also be bold in restraint. It cannot proclaim to be a vehicle of transformation while riding on the bloated engine of excess. The symbolism is glaring and dangerous. At a time when the nation is called to sacrifice, the GNU must not feast while the Nation fasts.

Minister Godongwana, in his wisdom and experience, must consider this. Among the many levers at his disposal, few are as politically potent and morally urgent as trimming the Executive and Administrative fat. This is not merely about fiscal savings. It is about restoring public trust. It is about sending a clear signal that this government does not govern from above, but alongside the people. And if we are truly rising, as a Nation, as a people, then we must rise not only in rhetoric, but in restraint.

The call for trimming the executive and administrative fat is not a populist outcry, it is a patriotic necessity. Because the legitimacy of the State is built not in boardrooms or press briefings, but in the sacrifices it is willing to make in solidarity with the people. If we are serious and I mean dead serious about restoring fiscal credibility and public trust, then the scissors must be wielded with both courage and consistency. Trimming the fat should not be a headline; it should be a national ethos. And here is what that must include, without hesitation and ceremonial foot-dragging:

• Collapse into one of the ministries with duplicated or competing mandates, such as agriculture and land reform. The land does not need two bureaucracies; it needs one focused institution that delivers.
• Do away with Deputy Ministerial positions, not some, but most, if not all. If we are to be a lean state, we must begin by slimming the top.
• Freeze public sector wage increases across the board, not selectively. And this includes the sacred cows, State-Owned Entities and Development Finance Institutions (DFIs). Let there be one national pay freeze, reflective of the shared economic hardship.
• Halt international travel, especially where presence does not translate into tangible outcomes. In an age of digital diplomacy, there is no excuse for million-rand delegations.
• Cancel unnecessary catering and luxury government functions. No more steak while the Nation eats starch. No more linen-draped banquets to announce empty reforms.

But let this truth echo beyond the Union Buildings. The Private Sector must not watch from the penthouse while the Nation bleeds on the pavement. Executive pay has ballooned into moral scandals. The Chief Executive Officers (CEOs) cannot be rewarded for profitability that coexists with poverty. 

So, we say with clarity:

• Freeze abnormal Executive increases.
• Disclose income inequality ratios within firms.
• Reinvest bonuses into job creation and upskilling.

This is not about austerity as punishment. This is austerity as moral realignment. Let the GNU lead by example, and let the private sector follow not out of obligation, but out of national conscience. Because if we are to demand sacrifice from the unemployed, from students, from pensioners, then those who sit in air-conditioned offices must sacrifice first. This is how trust is rebuilt. This is how national healing begins. Not with slogans, but with shared discipline and ethical leadership.

We have raised the mirror, held up the questions, examined the wounds, and challenged the orthodoxies. We have called for discipline, for ethical sacrifice, for mutual trust and genuine Nation-Building. We have spoken not just to the numbers, but to the conscience of a country struggling to find its soul in a budget line.

And so now, as the Nation holds its breath for the 2025 Budget Vote, we close not with fanfare, but with a solemn appeal: Your Excellency, Minister of Finance, Mr Enoch Godongwana, Madiba, Zondwa! As you take the podium on Wednesday,21 May 2025, break and shake the South African public and private sector economic landscape with strong, groundbreaking, and financially sustainable interventions. And in so doing, spare yourself the wrath of the masses of the South African people.

* Zamikhaya Maseti is a Political Economy Analyst with a Magister Philosophiae (M. PHIL) in South African Politics and Political Economy from the University of Port Elizabeth (UPE), now known as the Nelson Mandela University (NMU).

** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL, Independent Media or The African.