Cyril Ramaphosa’s confidence in Tito Mboweni questioned after SAA ‘smack down’
The president says closing SAA would de-stabilise the entire economy, and the DA now wants to know if the finance minister is a ‘lame duck’
The DA has questioned whether Tito Mboweni still enjoys the confidence of President Cyril Ramaphosa after his “smack down” of the new finance minister in Parliament on Tuesday. Answering questions from MPs in the National Assembly, Ramaphosa said there was no plan to close down SAA, as Mboweni had suggested, and that doing so would de-stabilise other state-owned enterprises (SOEs). “The effect of the ‘smack down’ was to cast the finance minister as a likable old man, who says what he thinks, but who is on the fringes of power, and who has very little, or no, influence on economic policy,” DA finance spokesperson David Maynier said in a statement. “The real question now is whether Tito Mboweni is a ‘lame duck’ finance minister who will serve as a placeholder until the general election, and will then be forced back into political exile.’’ Mboweni’s call for the disbanding of the airline was made at an investor conference in New York on Thursday. “It’s loss-making. We are unlikely to s...
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