The Democratic Alliance (DA) entered today’s retabling of the Eastern Cape provincial budget expecting a credible, pro-growth, pro-jobs adjustment that would ease the cost of living, unlock investment and set the Eastern Cape on a path to prosperity. What Finance MEC Mlungisi Mvoko delivered was the opposite. A reheated script devoid of fresh ideas, still clinging to promises that have not materialised.
Once again, we were reminded of a “R200 billion investment pipeline,” but were not shown a single binding agreement, timeline, or shovel-ready project that would turn pledges into pay slips.
The province now faces an R2.3 billion budget shortfall. MEC Mvoko claims it will be covered by an optimistic R1.8 billion from the province’s own revenue generation and R506.8 million from reserves.
Provincial revenue collection has underperformed for years. Banking on a sudden windfall while the economy crawls at 1.6 per cent growth borders on fantasy. If the target is missed, the provincial reserves have already been raided, leaving no buffer for shocks.
Spending priorities remain skewed. The social wage absorbs seventy-nine per cent of the budget, while a mere seventeen per cent is directed to the economic cluster. There is no new allocation for high-growth sectors and no concrete plan to slash the red tape throttling small firms.
Expanded Public Works job placements may pad employment statistics temporarily, but they do not build a productive economy.
Crucially, the MEC left the Scholar Transport allocation unchanged at R794 million, merely instructing the Department of Transport to “promote efficiencies” through a digital system and a new rate card.
This flies in the face of a resolution of the Legislature passed last week following a motion on Scholar Transport brought by the DA Shadow MEC for Education, Horatio Hendricks. The motion called for the House to acknowledge the crucial role of safe transport in ensuring the right to education for every learner and called for immediate and effective action to remedy the financial deficiencies currently affecting the system.
The ballooning Cost of Employment still crowds out investment, yet the budget tables no head-count strategy, no overtime cap and no skills redeployment framework. Every rand locked into bureaucracy is a rand lost to infrastructure, clinics and enterprise support.
Eastern Cape residents deserved a roadmap to prosperity. Instead, they received recycled rhetoric and an unbalanced budget propped up by false hope and withdrawals from savings.
Without decisive action to grow the revenue base, cut red tape, accelerate infrastructure development, and attract private capital, the province will continue to limp while unemployment, poverty, and out-migration worsen.
The DA alternative puts jobs first, protects the fiscus and holds the executive to account. Our people cannot afford another year of promises without progress.