Godongwana’s Budget Speech 2025 postponed at 11th hour
The different political parties in the GNU allegedly couldn’t agree on some issues within the Budget Speech, leading to a postponement.
Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s 2025 Budget Speech has been postponed at the last minute, the first time this has happened in democratic South Africa.
Scheduled to start at 14:00, Speaker of the National Assembly, Thoko Didiza, announced 15 minutes after the hour that Budget Speech 2025 would not take place as scheduled, supposedly over disagreements between political parties represented in President Cyril Ramaphosa’s government of national unity (GNU) Cabinet.
“I have just had a consultation with the whips of the all the political parties, following consultation with the leader of government business in Parliament [Deputy President Paul Mashatile]. In terms of Rule 48 [2], we have decided to adjourn proceedings for a date to be determined by the programming committee,” Didiza said to members of Parliament (MPs).
A new date – 12 March 2025 – has been pencilled in for Godongwana to deliver Budget Speech 2025.
Ahead of the start of the proceedings on Wednesday, it was revealed that Cabinet members had convened an urgent meeting at Tuynhuys, the president’s residence in Cape Town, following a deadlock over proposed tax increases, with Godongwana purportedly set to announce a decision to take VAT from 15% to 17%.
Addressing MPs, Didiza further told MPs about the events that preceded the postponement of Godongwana’s Budget Speech, saying the issue of raised taxes was behind the impasse.
“There has not been agreements in terms of parties in the executive to find one another in proposals of the budget,” said the speaker.
Budget Speech postponed: Malema unloads on Didiza over
Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema castigated Didiza for the postponement of Budget Speech 2025, saying she was shortchanging the people of South Africa by allowing the Budget Speech to not commence.
“It is going to be your legacy, speaker, that during your tenure Parliament could not debate and adopt a budget. You are now subjecting the budget of South Africa to party politics, when the budget is supposed to be above party politics.
“Let the budget speech [2025] be presented here, and let Parliament decide.
“We don’t have parties in the executive, we have the executive. The executive must come here [Parliament] and present the budget. There is no government… it has collapsed and it has no capacity to present a budget,” Malema said to Didiza.
Do you think this postponement signals a maturing democracy or a failing government?
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