<\/p>\n
Parties in the Government of National Unity (GNU) are preparing to discuss the budget proposal for the 2025\/26 financial year in the brief time allotted by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana before tabling a revised proposal.<\/p>\n
This occurs when GNU meetings and Cabinet discussions take place following the postponement of Godongwana\u2019s 2025 budget presentation on Wednesday due to the parties\u2019 inability to come to an agreement.<\/p>\n
The tax proposals, which the National Treasury want to use to generate R58 billion in the new financial year, were at the centre of the disagreement.<\/p>\n
In a statement, President Cyril Ramaphosa assured South Africans that the Cabinet\u2019s continuing deliberations on the budget will deliver outcomes that will protect vulnerable citizens and lay a platform for economic growth.<\/p>\n
Ramaphosa confirmed that the postponement was the result of a disagreement, but also collegial and mature consensus within Cabinet that budget proposals be worked through comprehensively and productively to secure the wellbeing of the economy and individual citizens.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are called upon as the national leadership to pursue all initiatives aimed at growth in order for us to increase employment and alleviate the effects of poverty.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Government of National Unity will in the coming days and weeks intensify our efforts to balance the imperatives that drive the fundamental growth objectives of this administration with the realities of a constrained fiscal environment,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
GOOD Party secretary-general Brett Herron said the GNU party leader\u2019s forum met with Ramaphosa and received a briefing on the draft budget.<\/p>\n
\u201cI expect that the National Treasury will brief the leaders on proposed revisions. GOOD is obviously represented at these engagements by our leader, Patricia de Lille,\u201d Herron said.<\/p>\n
He also said Deputy President Paul Mashatile has also called a \u201cclearing house\u201d meeting for next week.<\/p>\n
\u201cI will attend that but the agenda has not been issued yet so I don\u2019t know if the budget will be discussed,\u201d Herron said.<\/p>\n
DA spokesperson Willie Aucamp said his party has put up certain proposals on the budget.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe will again now drive those proposals we put forward in the Treasury and with the minister and try to persuade him that that is the way to go, not to increase taxes at all,\u201d Aucamp said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can cut spending and that is what the DA has proposed. We want a pro-growth budget. All those will be communicated as we have done in the past and we will put emphasis on that,\u201d said Aucamp.<\/p>\n
He said there would be interaction between the DA and the ANC as well as between the party\u2019s officials and the National Treasury.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t have specific dates but seeing the budget must be delivered, it does not give us a lot of time. They will continuously be working on this,\u201d Aucamp said<\/p>\n
Freedom Front Plus chief whip Wouter Wessels said Godongwana was mandated to go back and consider proposals already made and then engage in consultations.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe majority of discussions will be in the Cabinet. There will be mechanisms of the GNU to be utilised to ventilate some of these issues,\u201d Wessels said.<\/p>\n
He confirmed that Mashatile has convened a \u201cclearing house\u201d meeting for next week.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere will be a lot of meetings of political leaders of parties in the GNU and one such meeting took place on Wednesday morning before the Cabinet meeting. There will be quite a number of those.\u201d<\/p>\n
University of the Western Cape political studies department\u2019s Dr Jonathan Mark Hoskins said the tensions on the VAT was to be expected within the GNU.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy its very nature, the GNU is built on competing visions for South Africa\u2019s development. The parties involved not only hold different perspectives but in many cases, their viewpoints are deeply rooted in historically fractious divisions,\u201d Hoskins said.<\/p>\n
He also said the GNU was an unprecedented governance structure in South Africa.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is new political terrain. The process of finding a functional equilibrium within this coalition will inevitably lead to disagreements and standoffs. The current VAT dispute is just one of many such challenges that will arise,\u201d Hoskins added.<\/p>\n
mayibongwe.maqhina@inl.co.za<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Parties in the Government of National Unity (GNU) are preparing to discuss the budget proposal for the 2025\/26 financial year in the brief time allotted by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana before tabling a revised proposal. This occurs when GNU meetings and Cabinet discussions take place following the postponement of Godongwana\u2019s 2025 budget presentation on Wednesday […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[444,2735,11388,16440,2510,4165,17707,11209],"class_list":["post-232678","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-politics","tag-ahead","tag-budget","tag-discussions","tag-gnu","tag-march","tag-prepares","tag-presentation","tag-revised"],"yoast_head":"\n