Minister of Finance | Radio 94.7 FM

Ironic that Pravin Gordhan was the man who implemented the BBBEE regulations that contributed greatly to the demise of Eskom and other SOE”s and forbade business with any company not under black control.

Ironic because, as the current minister for Public Enterprises, he now has to fix the problems he helped to create previously when he was the minister for Finance.

Gordhan, as minister of Finance, implemented certain regulations in 2017 which were derived from a law enacted in 2000, called The Law on the Framework for Preferential Aquisition Policy.

The regulations implemented under Gordhan gave State Owned Enterprises like Eskom the authority to implement their own discretionary and arbitrary minimum black economic empowerment requirements.

These regulations come down to the race based exclusion of companies not under black control. As experience has taught us, these regulations were used to empower a small elite , very well connected
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Minister of Finance, Tito Mboweni, will deliver the Budget Speech 2019 in Cape Town on 20 February.

Expectations are high that he will balance competing expenditure priorities to stimulate economic growth in spite of fiscal consolidation measures.

However, the former central banker’s task is formidable and he will likely have a difficult balancing act on his hands.

One of the key balancing acts will be how Mboweni tackles the issue of the fuel levy.

In an analysis of the upcoming budget, PwC tax experts noted that the general fuel levy has been increased significantly in each of the four previous budgets as a means of raising additional tax revenues.

“The general fuel levy is only slightly progressive and was previously seen as being less politically sensitive than VAT,” PwC said.

“This perception has, however, changed with the increased attention resulting from the VAT increase in 2018. As such, it may no longer be
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