This year’s State of the Nation Address (SONA) is of particular importance as it is our Government
of National Unity’s (GNU) first one since its creation following last year’s elections. The focus of
this year’s SONA included: economic development, energy, employment, education and infrastructure.
Economic development:
The Medium Term Development Plan was announced, which places an emphasis on ‘inclusive growth’ and sets the goal of a 3% GDP growth for the next five years. The President outlined how job creation, poverty reduction and tackling the high cost of living would prove vital to achieving this.
Energy
The President celebrated South Africa’s 300 days with no load shedding, choosing to frame the return of the power outages as a reminder of the work needed to be done on the country’s energy infrastructure and efficiency. He referred to the Electricity Regulations Amendment Act promulgated in 2024, which aims to open up the energy sector to allow entities other than Eskom to emerge and compete, thus raising the availability and quality of energy available to South Africans.
In addition to this, the President recommitted South Africa to the global climate change movement and promoted private investment in renewable energy alternatives.
Education
Ramaphosa congratulated the Matric class of 2024, who boasted the highest pass rate the country has ever seen, with 87% of students who sat their final exams passing. Nearly half of which achieved a bachelors pass. Early development remains a priority of the government and this year’s focus will be on literacy rates, improving bilingual education and promoting careers in foundation phase education. Far more relevant to the majority of our readers (more so than Ramaphosa’s assertion that South Africa would become a leading actor in the commercial production of hemp and cannabis) is the
government’s policy on tertiary education. The President explained the private sector would be encouraged to provide experiential learning opportunities for students while they were studying. However it was evident that raising the lowest common denominator of education will be the priority.
Employment
South Africa’s youth was more of a focus in the government’s plans to address unemployment rates across the country which are sitting at 36.1%, with nine million youths not employed, seeking education or training. Ramaphosa explained how the government was working to strengthen pathways out of poverty, in providing the funding for 900 000 students from poor backgrounds to study at colleges and universities. The President praised existing initiatives such as the National
Pathway Management Network, underpinned by the SAYouth.mobi platform, which has helped 235 000 youths secure work opportunities; the Graduate Recruitment Scheme and the Social Employment Fund which has created over 80 000 jobs this year and supported more than 12 000 people in entrepreneurial activities.
Infrastructure
Many of the solutions that the government has proposed to implement in 2025 revolve around rehabilitating and building infrastructure. This will occur most prominently in South Africa’s ports, airports, railways and roads in order to revitalise and increase the efficiency of our mineral and agricultural exports, but also extends into the digitisation of our Visa system to benefit the inflow of professionals into the country and our tourism sector.
Commentators are cautiously optimistic about many of these pledges, but many will wait until the 2025 National Budget is announced in order to gain a clearer understanding of how these goals will be achieved. At the time of writing this article the Budget, which was intended to be announced on 19 February, has been postponed over disagreements in the GNU on a potential 2% increase of VAT to 17%.
By Leah Falcon
