Political Analyst Somadoda Fikeni says the African National Congress (ANC) needs to understand that creating jobs will not be easy because the country’s economy is not growing at a sufficiently rapid pace to facilitate this.
The South African economy grew by 2.2% quarter-on-quarter in the third quarter of 2018, ending the country’s second recession since 1994.
In its election manifesto, the ANC pledged to create jobs and attract investment.
However, Fikeni says a conducive environment needs to be created for this to be realised.
“These are processes which will take longer and the structural and deep problems that the country is facing socially and economically, it’s not the kind of thing that you are going to do overnight. To be honest, in that sense, lay out the plan with timelines.”
Meanwhile, some ANC supporters attending the launch of the party’s 2019 election manifesto say they are confident of overwhelming victory during the May polls.
Ramaphosa launched the manifesto which coincides with the party’s 107th anniversary celebrations at the Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban on Saturday afternoon.
Senior party officials, former president Jacob Zuma as well as representatives from fraternal parties such as Zimababwe’s ZANU-PF, Mozambique’s FRELIMO and Angola’s MPLA attended the event.
In the document dubbed a plan for a better life, the ANC seeks to create jobs as well as alleviate poverty and inequality in the next five years.
