The fuel price hike is criminal

Attached are soundbites in English and Afrikaans by Kevin Mileham MP, DA Shadow Minister of Mineral Resources and Energy

“The extension of the R1.50 relief that was also announced shows how absolutely flexible, unnecessary and abuseable the fuel levy is. It is also little more than a sideshow, designed to distract from the highest fuel price increase in history.” – Kevin Mileham MP

The ANC government is using the centrally controlled fuel price to thieve and loot South Africans of their money. The exorbitant new fuel price, announced a short while ago, is nothing short of criminal.

The ANC government, which adds 33% to the fuel price through taxes and levies, is taxing South Africa into poverty. The knock-on effect of this fuel price will literally take food off the table of hundreds of thousands of people. Starvation, malnutrition, and death caused by this is criminal too.

The extension of the R1.50 relief that was also announced shows how absolutely flexible, unnecessary and abuseable the fuel levy is. It is also little more than a sideshow, designed to distract from the highest fuel price increase in history.

Today’s announcement was an opportunity to do right by the people of South Africa, and an opportunity for the ANC government to end fuel taxes; but instead, unsurprisingly, they chose to add more misery to all South Africans.

The simple, effective demands the DA had made, would have stopped the skyrocketing fuel price, but the ANC chose to inflate prices instead.

The DA solution, which should have been adopted by the ANC government was simple:

1. Extend the temporary relief on the fuel levy, currently R1.50 per litre;
2. Better still, scrap the fuel levy entirely, saving R3.93 per litre;
3. Allow drivers out of the unnecessary R2.18 Road Accident levy; and
4. Deregulate the fuel price immediately, so that competition can drive down prices.

The DA will keep up the fight to slash fuel prices. This announcement does not deter us, but makes the fight more urgent and more meaningful. The DA is determined to make our demands inescapable by this failing ANC government.

The fight against these fuel prices goes on, with more vigour and determination

Today the ANC government may have chosen to give itself another tax boost, by squeezing us all at the pumps, but these are the actions of government which has long given up on caring for people – and the time is coming for people to give up on the ANC too.

An increase in fuel has a direct bearing on unemployment and poverty

Please find attached soundbite by Nicholas Nyati.

The DA Youth urges young South Africans to unite against the fuel price hikes and co-sign our letter to the Ministers of Finance and Mineral Resources and Energy to urge them to slash fuel prices by removing the taxes and levies hefted on fuel.

While youth unemployment in South Africa continues to soar, where two-thirds of young people do not have jobs, the cost of living has increased drastically and jobs are fast becoming a scarce commodity.

Fuel price increases have long-lasting effects on the people on the ground, particularly young job seekers who use public transport to seek opportunities. It also puts further pressure on those who have to juggle putting food on the table for their families while they are forced to spend an even bigger chunk of their income on public transport.

Unfortunately, public transport fares increases are permanent, as associations never decrease their prices in line with the current value of the fuel.

South Africans are already facing many challenges, and these continued increases will destroy whatever is left of our beautiful country – all the hopes and aspirations young South Africans carry on their way to work on a daily basis.

The ANC government is simply incapable and unwilling to address the socio-economic challenges that contribute to the staggering number of unemployed, and if statements by the Cabinet are anything to go by, these glow-in-the-dark flagsters have all the signs of a failed liberation movement leading us towards a failed state.

The continued fuel price increases are further proof that we do not have a leadership problem but an ANC problem. The ANC is more concerned about where to loot next, than the citizens they govern.

Join the DA in fighting the perpetual fuel increases by engaging on our social media spaces, in all our circles, and invite others to join us in defending what’s left of our future and that of our families.

Young people are the first and last line of defence in saving South Africa, for we understand that when the youth works, South Africa works.

More taxes? You must be joking, Fikile 

Please find attached soundbites in English and Afrikaans by Chris Hunsinger MP

The Department of Transport is preparing to hammer South Africans even harder, indicating a possible further tax on existing vehicle license fees or fuel sales.

The DA calls on Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula to open the recent White Paper where this proposal was published for immediate public participation. This proposal, just like the escalating fuel price, will have a devastating effect on ordinary South Africans and we call on the Minister to open it up for comments before the paper enters any Parliamentary process whatsoever.

With the astronomical fuel price hike set to take effect tomorrow, introducing a new tax on already overburdened South Africans is inconceivable; especially during a period when all evidence points to a looming human tragedy of unprecedented levels of poverty.

The White Paper contains preposterous proposals which the DA rejects, particularly a plan to increase the funding of roads by introducing a traffic-management levy to vehicle license fees and fuel sales.

Other problematic proposals include:

  • Centralisation of traffic fines where, a fine-collection procedures relating to traffic offences, penalties for non-payment will be deal with at national and provincial levels; and
  • Public Transport Funding: where a funding source such as road pricing, user-charging, the fiscus or fuel tax, might be identified as an option, etc.

The DA asks Minister Fikile Mbalula: Where must ordinary, struggling South Africans get the money from? Give the people the chance to make their voices heard.

BELA Bill: Lesufi confirms DA fears on language and race

Please find attached soundbite by Baxolile ‘Bax’ Nodada MP.

On Monday, the Gauteng MEC of Education, Panyaza Lesufi, confirmed what the DA has always believed regarding the Basic Education Laws Amendment (BELA) Bill – it will be used to force the ANC government’s narrow agenda regarding language on schools.

After the social and governance cluster post-budget vote briefing in Johannesburg, Lesufi reportedly said that no schools would be reserved for certain races or for races that speak a certain language.

The DA completely rejects Lesufi and the ANC government’s racist politics that equate skin colour with language and completely ignores the benefits of mother tongue education on quality education.

The DA has communicated extensively on the detrimental impact the BELA Bill, and the ‘Lesufi clause’ in particular, will have on schools and school governing bodies’ (SGBs) powers to determine language and admission policies of individual schools, and the more than 11 700 people that have signed our English and Afrikaans petitions indicate their strong disagreement with the Bill.

While Lesufi is touting the BELA Bill as a solution to racial divide, it is in fact nothing more than an extension of the ANC’s policy to vilify Afrikaans and scapegoat the language and its speakers – of all colours – for government’s continued failures in providing quality education for all in the past 28 years.

The truth of the matter is, that the BELA Bill will move schools’ admissions and language policies out of the hands of SGBs who know their communities’ needs best, into the hands of the provincial Heads of Department of Education, with appeals to the MEC. And we know his decision in advance.

The DA urges the public to submit their concerns in writing to Llewellyn Brown, the secretary of the parliamentary portfolio committee on basic education via email to belabill02@parliament.gov.za or online at https://forms.gle/MoC6AdbdQyYPk3Y49 or via WhatsApp: +27 60 550 9848 by no later than 15 June 2022 at 16:00.

Together we can fight the BELA Bill, which is nothing more than a vehicle for the ANC to enforce their divisive language policies.

QLFS: ANC has run out of ideas on growth and jobs

Please find attached a soundbite by Dr Michael Cardo MP.

Despite marginal improvements in the unemployment rate on the back of imperfect data (the official unemployment rate now sits at 34.5% and the expanded rate at 45.5% ) the latest Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS) underscores the need for fresh economic thinking.

We are confronted with a pandemic of joblessness. But instead of mitigating the national disaster with workable solutions, the ANC is recycling the same tired old ideas ahead of its Policy Conference in July.

The ruling party’s discussion documents reveal a dearth of innovative economic proposals. Meanwhile President Cyril Ramaphosa still clings to the fallacy that Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) is a ‘must for growth’.

All of this just shows that the ANC is stuck chin-deep in the economic quicksands without any sort of a roadmap or compass. It can only drive us deeper and deeper into the morass.

The private sector alone is able to create jobs at scale by absorbing predominantly low-skilled people into employment. The DA is committed to unleashing the private sector’s potential. That is why in national government, as our first order of business, we would do three things to stimulate job-creation:

  • Scrap the automatic extension of collective bargaining council agreements to small and new firms and those who didn’t sign them in the first place.
  • Empower individual economic sectors to set their own minimum wages, and offer tax exemptions to small businesses to help them absorb the cost of minimum wages.
  • Put a stop to onerous racial legislation that deters investors, strangles growth and kills jobs — like the job-destroying Employment Equity Amendment Bill, which currently sits on the President’s desk awaiting his signature.

All the President’s talk of social compacting amounts to a shifting of deckchairs on the Titanic. He is completely out of touch.

In his newsletter yesterday, the President claimed that BEE is ‘about eradicating inequality’, when in fact BEE is so obviously a crony-enrichment scheme for ANC fat cats: it has served to deepen inequality in South Africa. In the same way, the Employment Equity Amendment Bill will lead to job losses and widen the gap between economic insiders and outsiders.

Until the government takes the hard decisions that will begin to arrest our economic decline — like reforming the rigid labour market, scrapping racial legislation and ditching its hare-brained localisation scheme – SA is headed for mounting job losses.

Don’t sign the job-killing Employment Equity Amendment Bill, Mr President

Please find attached Open Letter from the DA Federal Leader John Steenhuisen MP, calling on the President not to sign into law the Employment Equity Amendment Bill.

Dear President Ramaphosa

RE: EMPLOYMENT EQUITY AMENDMENT BILL

You have, on your desk and awaiting your assent, the Employment Equity Amendment Bill. This Bill was passed by the National Assembly at the end of last year, and has just been passed by the National Council of Provinces. It now requires only your signature to be passed into law. I am asking you not to do this.

If you are at all serious about a reform agenda that will reignite our stalled economy, create jobs on a large scale and lift millions of desperate South Africans out of poverty and into employment, you will surely know that this Bill stands between you and this goal. You will no doubt be pressured by those in your party who do not support a reform agenda to put your signature on the Bill, but you cannot be unaware of the devastating effect this Bill will have on future investment and jobs.

Despite its name, the Employment Equity Amendment Bill will not bring about transformation in the workplace. It will not achieve a levelling of the playing field, and it will do nothing for the almost 12 million South Africans who do not have jobs. We all know by now that the names given to such undertakings often serve as a fig leaf for their actual purpose and effect. Just as Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment has done nothing but further impoverish this broad base while enriching a thin sliver of well-connected individuals, the Employment Equity Amendment Bill will do the opposite of what it says on the box.

Clause 4 of the Bill – which introduces Section 15A to the Act – confers on the Employment and Labour Minister sweeping powers to pick national economic sectors and then assign numerical race targets to these sectors. This will certainly scare off precious investment and chase away the skills and capital our country so desperately needs right now. We are already seeing a flight of skills, capital and taxpayers that we could not afford at the best of times, let alone the dire economic circumstances we now find ourselves in.

On top of this, clause 12 of the Bill – which operationalises Section 53 of the Act – reserves state contracts for employers who are in possession of a compliance certificate issued by the Minister. And such a certificate can only be obtained by meeting any sectoral target set by the Minister. This power will make it possible to manipulate state tenders and funnel contracts to specially chosen beneficiaries – something we know all about thanks to four sections of the Zondo report.

And all of this is done under the guise of transformation. Almost every government swindle – from inflated local government procurement contracts all the way up to the Guptas and State Capture – has taken place under cover of transformation, empowerment and equity. But while connected cadres have gotten richer and richer thanks to these interventions, ordinary South Africans have never had it worse. Broad unemployment now stands at more than 46% and we’re in the longest downward economic cycle since the Second World War. Last year alone more than a million jobs were lost.

Even if we did everything right from here on, life would still become extremely hard in the coming months and years for those South Africans without savings and steady income. The lingering effects of the Covid lockdowns together with the impact of the war in Ukraine will bring our economy to breaking point, and the coming food and fuel inflation will be deadly for many of our people.

Those are the people in whose shoes you need to walk before deciding whether to put your signature on this Bill. Not the bubble of South Africans who are resilient against economic shocks, but the 30 million men, women and children who already live below the upper-bound poverty line and who face hunger and even starvation with the stroke of your pen.

If you are serious about fixing our broken country, you have to start judging your government’s policies and interventions by their actual outcome, and not by the noble-sounding but meaningless name given to them. Do the right thing, Mr President, and send this Bill back to Parliament.

Yours faithfully,
John Steenhuisen, DA Leader

Where is the June Fuel Price announcement?

Please find attached English and Afrikaans soundbites by Kevin Mileham MP.

With just 40 hours until the June 2022 fuel price changes, the ANC government is yet to announce the exact price consumers will be forced to pay at the pumps from midnight on Tuesday.

No doubt the ANC government is fearful of the growing backlash which is already building against this fuel price hike. And with growing realization of the exorbitant 33% tax rate on fuel, imposed by the ANC government, South Africans are right to be outraged and pushing back against any further price hikes.

Without the announcement of the June fuel price hike having yet been made, the DA repeats our demands to the ANC government to end the exorbitant taxes on fuel and show some care to the people of South Africa by:

  1. Extending the temporary relief on the fuel levy, currently R1.50 per litre;
  2. Better still, scraping the fuel levy entirely, saving R3.93 per litre;
  3. Allowing drivers out of the unnecessary R2.18 Road Accident levy; and
  4. Deregulating the fuel price immediately, so that competition can drive down prices.

In just 6 days almost 70 000 South Africans have signed the DA letter to the Ministers of Energy and Finance, backing the DA demand to slash fuel prices.

Now, as the country awaits the June fuel price announcement the ANC government finds itself facing a most critical and serious test: Will it show care, or will it continue to tax South Africans into poverty?

Patricia de Lille and the Committee Chairperson on Public Works colluding to restrict access to the SACAP investigation report

The Parliament Committee Chairperson on Public Works and Infrastructure, Nolitha Ntobongwana, appears to be colluding with Minister Patricia de Lille to cover up and stop access to a report into serious allegations at the South African Council for the Architectural Profession (SACAP).

The DA will be writing to Parliament’s Chair of Chairs, Cedric Frolick, requesting that he intervenes and compels Ntobongwana to release the SACAP investigation report to Committee members.

Following allegations of governance challenges, lack of leadership, bullying, sexual harassment, and maladministration at SACAP, the DA had requested an investigation. However, the investigation’s findings were never made public or served before members of the parliament’s Portfolio Committee on Public Works and Infrastructure.

During a committee meeting on the 18th of May, three different officials separately confirmed to committee members that Ntobongwana has the SACAP investigation report.

Early last week, Ntobongwana made an undertaking to provide me with a copy of the report by Friday, the 28th of May 2022. Three days later, I still have not received the report.

The question is why has Ntobongwana not made available this report to committee members if there isn’t anything to hide? Her conduct is consistent with the same stalling tactics that have been used by Minister de Lille to restrict access to the report.

De Lille rejected the DA’s PAIA application to have access to the SACAP report citing inapplicable provisions of the Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA). When the DA lodged an appeal against her decision, de Lille chose to ignore it, violating statutory provisions of the PAIA Act.

The conduct of Ntobongwana and de Lille is deeply regrettable in that they are going to extremes to try and shield SACAP from accountability. Recently, we learned through media reports that the two whistleblowers who first raised alarm about the governance crisis at SACAP, leading to the said investigation, are now being victimised and threatened.

The continued failure to issue the investigation report is now an officially sanctioned sustained victimisation of these whistleblowers. As a constitutional body tasked with holding the Executive to account and representing the interests of all South Africans, Parliament should never be used to cover up the illegality being spearheaded by de Lille and Ntobongwana. The public has a right to know and the report must be issued without further delay.

NHC must take a stand against proposed name change of Taalmonument

Please find attached Veronica van Dyk MP soundbites in English and Afrikaans.

The DA has written to the Chairperson of the National Heritage Council (NHC), Edgar Neluvhalani, to urge him to take a stand against the Minister of Sports, Arts and Culture, Nathi Mthethwa’s proposal to change the name of the Afrikaanse Taalmuseum en -monument.

NHC has a mandate to improve knowledge production on all South African heritage and promote awareness of it. However, the Council has yet to make their stance on the matter known.

The Minister has made it his mission to waste public money that could have benefited people employed by the arts and culture sectors on vanity projects that fail to bring true transformation to relationships or the economy.

The Minister fails to recognize the Afrikaanse Taalmonument’s extensive efforts to include Afrikaans’ roots and influences from other African languages. In doing this, the Monument has done far more for fostering the development of indigenous languages in South Africa than Minister Mthethwa could ever hope to achieve. He and the rest of the Poverty Cabinet have in fact decided to scapegoat Afrikaans to try and excuse the ANC government’s malfeasance, corruption, a decline of service delivery, and rising unemployment.

Instead of focusing on vanity projects, Ministers must prioritize the well-being of South Africans.