President Cyril Ramaphosa addresses delegates at Gallagher Estate in Midrand on 1 November 2022. Picture: Nigel Sibanda
President Cyril Ramaphosa has dismissed the suggestion that his Cabinet is bloated and says he is committed to restructuring government.
Ramamphosa responded to questions in the National Assembly on Thursday, after making changes to his executive – including two new ministries – earlier this week.
The president appointed Kgosientsho Ramokgopa as the country’s new Minister of Electricity and Maropene Ramokgopa as Minister for Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation.
Although he indicated that ministries would be reduced in the future, a number of political parties have expressed their dissatisfaction over Ramaphosa’s move.
During the Q&A session, Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP) MP Mkhuleko Hlengwa asked the president on whether he intends to dissolve the Department of Public Enterprises and house state-owned enterprises in their respective line function departments.
“Mr president, respectfully, I put it to you that you are not committed to your own commitments insofar as the reconfiguration of government is concern.
“Every year, every Sona [State of the Nation Address] you kick the can down the road,” Hlengwa said.
“[During] Sona [debate], I put it to you [that] every time your government departments and ministries fail… you take on the responsibilities into the Presidency. So Mr president, are you committed to the commitments you made to the country because it seems as if everything you say does not happen?”
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In his response, Ramaphosa pointed out that prior to 2019, there were 34 ministries.
“I reduced that to 28 with the initial reconfiguration that I spoke about,” he said.
The president stressed that the objective was to reduce it even further.
“We are dealing with two key problems. One of problem is electricity and I did say I would like to appoint a minister of electricity which would increase the number of ministries to 29.
“In the course of looking at everything, including the enhancement of the capability of the state and the implementation process to get us over these challenges that we are having, I decided on a standalone ministry of monitoring and evaluation, to make sure that there’s full implementation. That has then brought us to 30 ministries, but not to the 34 that we had, and I have said that this was a transitory process.”
Ramaphosa said government has to ensure that the work gets done over the next 12 to 15 months.
“Beyond that, in the next administration when this party will be back as the governing party, we will come back and reconfigure the state.”
He added that the Public Enterprises Ministry will eventually cease to exist, adding that a holding company will overlook state-owned enterprises (SOEs).
“The entities that are now overseen by the ministry will revert back to their departments. We are going to look at the merger of certain departments so that we have a much more efficient executive where we have lesser ministries. This is work in progress and the end, as far as I am concern, is in sight.”
Democratic Alliance (DA) leader John Steenhuisen asked if it was fair that Cabinet members were “living like rock stars” while ordinary citizens suffer.
“[They have] 98 mansions worth over a billion rand, free generators, free electricity and high-end luxury vehicles,” he said.
“Well, I don’t know about rock stars,” Ramaphosa responded.
The president also emphasised that the two new ministries were “time-bound”.
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“They are going to go further down. Watch this space.”
He refuted Steenhuisen’s assertion that South Africa had the largest Cabinet across the globe, saying the country was “basically in line with others”.
“I can understand on your side when you say it’s bloated [but] by any means we are not the biggest Cabinet in the world.”
Ramaphosa previously said the Presidency and National Treasury will work together to “rationalise government departments, entities and programmes over the next three years”.