National Chairperson, Cde Gwede Mantashe,

Former President Thabo Mbeki,

Members of the National Executive Committee,

We have come to the end of a very productive National Executive Committee meeting, having covered a number of areas that are critical for our country, our movement and the people of our country.

We have spent time reflecting on current challenges and opportunities and have identified some of the key actions that we need to take as this leadership to renew and build our organisation with a view of taking this country forward. We dedicated time to discuss the state of the economy and the actions we need to take to drive inclusive economic growth and job creation.

We characterised our economy as being in a state of emergency that requires urgent action. Our focus on an inclusive and resilient economy is particularly important as we begin Women’s Month.

The financial and economic inclusion of women is vital to the empowerment of women and the achievement of gender equity – and is also central to our effort to tackle poverty and advance the interests of all people in our country. Our discussion on the economy focused on the actions we need to take to give effect to the strategic priority of inclusive growth and job creation as contained in the Medium Term Development Plan, adopted by the government of our country.

We have reaffirmed that industrial policy must be the leading instrument of economic development and transformation, which will in turn help to shape our trade policy. For this industrial policy to succeed, we need an all-of-government approach. As the presentation from the ANC Economic Transformation Committee noted, this requires coordinated alignment across multiple centres of state power, not just trade, industry and competition, but also energy and electricity, transport, water, agriculture, land reform and rural development, public works and infrastructure, public enterprises, higher education, science and innovation, minerals and petroleum, finance, and labour.

We noted that our network industries need to be efficient, reliable and competitive if we are to drive the industrialisation that is so much needed in our economy. 

We must therefore ensure that our Integrated Resource Plan advances energy security and emission reduction targets while reducing the cost of electricity to the economy and more particularly to households. We must continue with the restructuring of the electricity sector to ensure increased levels of competition and lower prices.

Full speech attached.