Johannesburg, Feb 17: South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has said the dire economic situation of the country keeps him awake at night. Ramaphosa was speaking to the media on Wednesday after responding to Parliament, which had just finished debating for two days his earlier State of the Nation address.
“I am seriously kept awake at night by the state of our economy and the state of our unemployment. It’s a very difficult thing to have to countenance 11 million people who are out work; who are not economically engaged in any activity that is enough to keep me awake at night and it concerns me a great deal, Ramaphosa said. The President also reacted to a query on when he would act against his Cabinet ministers, who were responsible for alleged differences between them that led to the widespread looting, arson and deaths in July last which forced the government to call in the military.
Ramaphosa hinted at a possible Cabinet reshuffle without giving any details, except to confirm that changes would be coming soon. There have been public calls for the heads of the ministers of police and state security to roll after it emerged that they had not acted on reports about the imminent violence.
Ramaphosa defended his entire Cabinet though. I take the responsibility and we take responsibility as a Cabinet for the mishap. That is what the report (on the violence, released last week) said. But even if the report had not been put in that way by the panel, it is something that we should own up to, he said.
Ramaphosa said the National Security Council (NSC) that did not meet in the preceding nine years has been revived back into existence. For most of that period, Jacob Zuma, who is facing criminal charges and allegations of facilitating state capture, was president of the country.
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