ANC going for green energy, permanent basic income grant, Ramaphosa back for SONA 2.0 - Prof Theo Venter

Despite surveys and polls indicating that the ANC’s support in the coming elections could drop to below 50%, Prof Theo Venter, a political analyst at the University of Johannesburg expects President Cyril Ramaphosa to be back in Parliament to deliver the second SONA after the election. In a post-SONA interview with Biznews, Venter detailed the ANC’s potential voter base, including 30% of the rural vote, 10-12% of urban voters and he expects that a permanent Basic Income Grant could add another 5% to the ANC’s tally, bringing it close to the 50% threshold to stay in power. He described President Ramaphosa’s claims of ANC successes over the past 30 years as unconvincing and expressed scepticism that more than 10% of stolen state capture funds will be recovered. Amid stage 6 loadshedding over the weekend, Venter dismissed Ramaphosa’s assurances of an end to the worst of loadshedding as political campaign rhetoric. Venter also commented on Ramaphosa ‘looking for a pen’ to sign the National Health Insurance legislation, suggesting that the President might be reluctant to sign the bill. The one positive aspect of the speech, he said, is that the ANC clarified it is going for green energy and a just energy initiative focusing on Mpumalanga, which is ironically a model that was very actively pushed by former Eskom CEO, André de Ruyter.