Jonas calls on civil society to help take SA forward

SOUTH Africa would need the right policies and leadership to take the country forward over the next five years – and civil society had an integral role to play in ensuring this happened, former deputy finance minister Mcebisi Jonas said on Thursday.
Speaking at the Daily Dispatch business summit in East London, Jonas said despite the current challenges facing the country, it was not all doom and gloom.

The country had strong accounting structures and existing infrastructure and needed a national conversation which would drive it towards a new con
Jonas said South Africa should not be beholden to ‘party barons’ for direction.

“Citizens need to become more active in driving change and shaping the national agenda.”

Jonas said the current path of South Africa would lead to doom for all and that it was time for the country’s people to pull together and to become agents for change.
He said people should stop obsessing about factions within the ANC when the true problem was that the country – and its economy – was being stolen.
Some political leaders were being driven by their own agendas and corrupt interests, he said.
Citizens needed to look at political parties on the basis of merit only while the future of South Africa depended on civil society, including business, churches and trade unions, joining in taking up the challenges facing the country.
Jonas said the integrity of the state also needed to be restored as the state was currently constrained by the ‘rot’ of state capture.

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