[imagesource: Jeffrey Abrahams / Gallo Images]

My fellow South Africans.

In this, the year 2021, we must celebrate small victories where we can find them, so let’s start with the biggest plus of this year’s state of the nation address (SONA).

This year’s iteration will cost ‘just’ R100 000, having surpassed R9 million in years gone by, before being capped at R2,2 million in 2019.

According to TimesLIVE, the only major costs involved are paying for the virtual platform for capturing the proceedings, and purchasing candles for a candlelight ceremony in honour of the 47 000-plus people who have died from COVID-19.

There will be no fawning questions on the red carpet, as journalists ask politicians who they are wearing, rather than how they intend to serve the people.

Please, on behalf of every sane South African, can we keep it this way? I have absolutely no desire to know who made which minister’s dress or suit pants. Make it stop.

We can also do away with the gun salute, military, and police parade – deploy them to an area where they’re actually needed.

All in all, just 30 MPs will be able to physically attend the proceedings, and the EFF will not be present in the National Assembly chamber, so we can rule out hard hats being used as weapons.

On to Ramaphosa’s address itself, or that really big annual family meeting, which he is due to deliver at 7PM. The Daily Maverick outlines what we can expect.

Eskom and load shedding 

With South Africa still reeling from load shedding despite years of promises that he had it under control, Ramaphosa will focus on risk mitigation strategies. He is likely to emphasise that the Department of Mineral Resources and Energy is evaluating bids to bring 2,000MW in additional capacity to the grid.

Ramaphosa is also expected to speak about how municipalities will soon be able to buy power from independent suppliers.

The thing is, we’ve heard all the load shedding promises before. Many, many times, in fact – just read this thread:

To celebrate our Stage 3 #Loadshedding, here’s a little thread on Cyril Ramaphosa and his various Eskom pledges and assurances.

When you get to the end, let me know how you would rate his performance these past six years, on a scale from 1 to 10. pic.twitter.com/ibI1mzeUgL

— Jacques Maree (@JacquesMaree73) February 10, 2021

Ramaphosa is also expected to address import substitution or localisation, Infrastructure South Africa, presidential employment stimulus, and needing a bit of help from the private sector as the government runs out of funds.

We should get an update on when vaccines are likely to be rolled out, after the recent setback, and hopefully more info on the recent report by the Special Investigating Unit (SIU), which detailed widespread looting of the COVID-19 relief funds.

You can read the nitty-gritty on those here, but let’s focus on something else that has been front and centre of the news again, the Zondo Commission:

Ramaphosa always puts a line into his speeches to emphasise his support for the Zondo Commission of Inquiry into State Capture. After ANC Deputy Secretary-General Jessie Duarte’s attack on Deputy Chief Justice Raymond Zondo, Ramaphosa could use Sona to show that hers is not a unified position.

Or we could start prosecuting en masse those whose dirty deeds have been exposed during the years and years the commission has been running?

Finally, economists are predicting a bumpy ride, reports TimesLIVE:

The economy is expected to have contracted by more than 7% in 2020 and the International Monetary Fund forecast last month that it will recover to grow at only 2.8% in 2021, rather than the 3.6% forecast by the Reserve Bank and Treasury.

Most economists then expect the economy to slide back to its sluggish 1% trend, in the absence of decisive and long-promised structural reforms.

All in all, given that we’ve had to deal with so many 8PM ‘family meetings’ already, I think you can be excused for skipping this one.

[sources:timeslive&timeslive&dailymaverick]