WATCH: Ramaphosa responds to questions in National Assembly

Some of his toughest critics, like the Democratic Alliance and the Economic Freedom Fighters will have their first opportunity to publicly address the president for the first time since lockdown began.

The effectiveness of the lockdown and how the government is dealing with Covid-19 will undoubtedly be on their agenda.

Last night President Ramaphosa addressed the nation and spoke about easing Level 3 restrictions.

He also laid out government’s response to the pandemic, which will now focus on dealing with infection hotspots, through the deployment of multidisciplinary intervention teams, increased testing, and screening.

There will however be a shift to more targeted testing, prioritising those in hospitals, healthcare workers, the elderly, and those in hotspots, as the shortage of test kits worldwide worsens.

Ramaphosa, said government is using “every avenue available to increase testing capacity and improve turnaround time”.

This includes the use of a single continental market place for African countries, which provides test kits and other critical medical supplies.

In the three weeks prior to the implementation of the national lockdown, infections doubled every two days, but the lockdown bought the country some much needed time, by extending that time to 15 days during level 5, and 12 days at present.

This allowed government to implement several precautionary measures in the country’s health system.

After 100 days, he warned that we are still only at the start of the epidemic, and it may yet be with us for a while to come.

The president says that as the country continues to open, the risk will naturally increase, but emphasised that infection is by no means inevitable”, especially if people continue to adhere to social distancing measures and the wearing of masks in public.

You can watch the question and answer session here: