In his State of the Nation Address (SONA) on Thursday night, President Cyril Ramaphosa highlighted some of the key points in his plans to make South Africa a better nation in terms of service delivery and safety for the citizens. 

Chief among them is the fight against crime, which is escalating in certain areas around the country, such as in Gauteng and Western Cape, where gangsters seem to be operating with impunity. 

Ramaphosa said South Africa can be a stronger nation once crime, which cuts short the lives of community members and creates an uncertain future, must be addressed at its roots.

“To strengthen our fight against gang violence, I am deploying the South African National Defence Force to support the police, as we did to great effect with illegal mining.

“I have directed the Minister of Police and the SANDF to develop a tactical plan on where our security forces should be deployed within the next few days in the Western Cape and Gauteng to deal with gang violence and illegal mining.” 

He added that he will inform the National Assembly and the National Council of Provinces about the details of deploying the army, including the time of the deployment, areas to be targeted, and the cost that will go with it.

“We have to act to rid our country of gang violence,” he said.

Ramaphosa stated that the South African Police Service (SAPS) will this year receive an additional 5,500 newly recruited police officers in addition to the 20,000 announced in the previous SONA.

“At the same time, we are implementing an integrated strategy to address the root causes of crime through coordinated interventions across society, from street lighting to access to social services.

“We are going to tackle gun crime by streamlining legislation and regulations on licensing, possessing, and trading in firearms and ammunition.” 

While the fight against corruption has led to the country being removed from the Financial Action Task Force’s grey list, there is still more to be done to strengthen anti-corruption laws to remove rotten potatoes from the state organs, especially within the law enforcement agencies, he explained.

Early this month, the president announced a special task team to investigate police officers in the SAPS and metro officers who have been implicated in the Madlanga Commission of Inquiry into criminality, political interference, and corruption in the criminal justice system.

“As we have successfully done with previous commissions, we will use the recommendations of the Madlanga Commission to make far-reaching changes.

“The State Security Agency will re-vet the senior management of the South African Police Service and metro police departments. The vetting process will include lifestyle audits,” he said.

He would also use this year’s SONA to escalate the fight against the threats posed in the country’s economy by illegal and counterfeit goods. 

“We are establishing a national illicit economy disruption programme that brings together key state agencies and other stakeholders, including the private sector.

“Through effective use of data analytics, we will be targeting high-risk sectors like tobacco, fuel, alcohol and other counterfeit products,” Ramaphosa said.

He also touched on what his government will do to address the increasingly extreme weather conditions, which in the past couple of weeks led to catastrophic flooding in Limpopo and Mpumalanga, causing the loss of at least 45 lives and destruction of homes, schools, clinics, and other infrastructure.

“The classification of the floods as a national disaster has enabled the national and provincial government to prioritise funding to address the most pressing needs of the people affected,” he said.

He also instructed Water and Sanitation Minister Penny Majodina and Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Velenkosini Hlabisa to start working on addressing water scarcity in Johannesburg, Knysna, and Giyani, where residents have protested demanding to be supplied with this essential resource.

“These protests have been fuelled by frustrations over inadequate and unreliable access to basic services, such as water. I have directed the minister to attend to the water shortage problem and engage with our communities.

“To ensure water security in the long term, we are building new dams and upgrading existing infrastructure. We have committed more than R156 billion in public funding for water and sanitation infrastructure alone over the next three years.”

The government has committed more than R1 trillion in public investment over three years to build and maintain infrastructure, which, according to Ramaphosa, is the largest allocation of its kind in the country’s history. 

“Through the Infrastructure Fund and new regulations for public-private partnerships, we are using innovative funding models, reducing risk, and attracting investors to fast-track projects in energy, water, transport, and digital infrastructure.

“We launched our first-ever infrastructure bond to raise funding for the infrastructure drive, which was more than two times oversubscribed.”

The Industrial Development Corporation announced this week more than R300 million in funding for the Frontier Rare Earths Project in the Northern Cape, which Ramaphosa said has the potential to become one of the world’s largest and lowest cost new producers of minerals that are needed for smartphones, lithium batteries, and other products.

bongani.hans@inl.co.za

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