Govt must focus on economy, not job creation, says economist

Dawie Roodt, chief economist at Efficient Group, said: “We have to do everything to grow the economy. Everything else must wait, grow this economy first.”

He was reacting to a suggestion by President Cyril Ramaphosa about a plan to convene various economic social partners once more to work together to devise a new plan focusing on job creation and preservation. This is one of the issues raised by Ramaphosa in his latest online newsletter yesterday.

He said the partners agree that recovery efforts should be led by infrastructure development and maintenance. They will also look at exploring and strengthening identified new sources with growth potential.

“There is now general consensus that our recovery should be led by infrastructure development and maintenance,” he said.

Ramaphosa said the most important part of the joint plan by the South African social partners must be the protection and creation of jobs, including crafting of public employment schemes. But Roodt said jobs would come once the economy grew.

He said the best way to grow the economy was to stop land expropriation without compensation because it scared off investors. He also insisted calls for the Reserve Bank to be nationalised must cease and government must do away with black economic empowerment and all forms of discrimination.

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