LETTER: ANC won’t cut public spending

As Kabelo Khumalo reports, there is a dire need to cut public spending as the limitations of SA’s fiscal resources are becoming more and more apparent (“Red flag as budget deficit widens to 6% of GDP”, February 5).         

But despite this urgent need it is unlikely that the government will do the hard and rational thing. The ANC is a populist socialist party at heart, and it excels at ignoring reality in favour of bribing the public while formulating grandiose and ultimately devastating policies.

Just look at National Health Insurance (NHI) and the plans to expand public healthcare. The public coffers simply can’t afford such a project. But the government doesn’t care. It will shoot private healthcare in the foot while spending money that doesn’t exist, creating incompetent public facilities that probably won’t work.

On top of this, regulations, labour overreach, BEE, load-shedding and socialist rhetoric continue to shrink our economy, leading to less and less tax revenue.

But the ANC doesn’t care. It wants to destroy the private sector because it is something it doesn’t control. It will not cut spending because it is, as Khumalo reports, an election year. And on top of that, I don’t think the ANC truly understands what debt entails and what a deficit means.

The solution to SA’s problems is rational policymakers who are willing to make spending cuts, deregulate and embrace a pragmatic and sound economic system. And if we want that, we’re going to need to vote for it.

Nicholas Woode-Smith
Cape Town

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