[imagesource: Esa Alexander]

If you follow Tito Mboweni on Twitter, you can be forgiven for thinking that he’s probably high at times.

That cannot be confirmed, but it does appear that our finance minister is in favour of taking steps to legalise cannabis.

Yesterday, Mboweni posted a series of photos from an unnamed farm. Given that he had previously tweeted from Tzaneen, and owns a farm there, it seems that is the farm he is referring to.

So, what has he found?

Ah yes, the classic ‘I just found this stuff, how did it get here?’ line. Used it many times, myself.

The responses to his tweet were overwhelmingly in favour of legalisation, and Tito figures that it makes financial sense, too:

As we know from his budget speech, that tax money is much needed.

After the feedback he received, Mboweni declared that he will present the proposal to Cabinet later this month:

Good work, Tito. We may be suffering through continued bouts of load shedding, but that doesn’t mean we need to live in the dark ages with regards our cannabis laws.

Yes, it has been decriminalised for personal and private use, but that’s very different to legalising it.

Sadly, Mboweni lost some street cred with the younger generation when he posted a typical ‘Boomer’ selfie later in the evening:

Reminds me of having a Skype call with the folks back in the day, 80% of which was spent telling them they don’t need to be within 10cm of the camera or microphone.

For some extra insight, and pot-related puns, we head to the Daily Maverick:

The fact is that new policy needs to be crafted in the wake of the 2018 Constitutional Court ruling that current prohibitions were unconstitutional and invalid. There has been a lot of talk since, but not much in the way of concrete action — a recurring theme of the Ramaphosa administration…

Mboweni does not have a lot of fiscal space left in the face of looming rating downgrades and an economy that is barely growing at best and probably contracting as Eskom battles to keep the lights on.

Raising taxes on booze and smokes — “sin taxes” as they are known — has long been a staple in the February Budget speeches delivered by South African finance ministers. Mboweni clearly sees a tempting third category here.

Later in January, the Cabinet will have that to put in its collective pipe. Cannabis advocates hope it will smoke it.

Wake up and smell the tax revenue, Cabinet.

[source:dailymaverick]