Malusi Gigaba

Cape Town, (NNN-SA NEWS) : The government’s planned radical transformation of the economy should not bring about disquiet given the fact that many South Africans have been excluded from participating in the economy, says Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba.

“The debate about radical economic transformation is an ongoing discussion in South Africa and I don’t think we need to fear that discussion. We need not suppress it,” Gigaba told Parliament’s Finance Committee here Tuesday.

He noted that South Africa comes from a history where the majority were excluded from the economy and as a result, many were left outside the mainstream economy. A large group in the population participates in the second economy, with many of them being black and women with “no bridge to join the first economy, even though they are living in a democratic dispensation”.

“Over the years, we largely have had these people remain marginalised from participating in the formal economy,” he said, adding that many still did not have access to land and assets.

This group remains unemployed and without skills. “This plight does not confine itself to unemployment. It also includes their desire to own land, assets and have access to the financial sector so that they become self-sustaining and independent.”

What the government is trying to address now is how to get the majority of South Africans not just to be employed but how to get them to participate in the economy, to own assets and become self-sustaining.

Gigaba said in present day South Africa, about 10 per cent of the population owns about 42 per cent of the wealth of the country. The debate, he said, ought to be around how to industrialise the South African economy in order to eradicate poverty, inequality and unemployment.