Amid red warnings on the economy, President Cyril Ramaphosa’s 100-day deadline for civil society, business and labour to forge a new social compact to create jobs and fight deepening poverty expires next week.
That is if you count calendar days, which puts Ramaphosa’s deadline at 21 May. A more generous interpretation — that he may have meant working days when he announced the compact in his state of the nation address — gives parties until the end of June to find each other.
But, according to the parliamentary coordinator of labour federation Cosatu, Matthew Parks: “Whichever one you choose, I don’t think you’re going to meet either. It’s not going to happen. We have not even got to the stage of any clear proposals at Nedlac [the National Economic Development and Labour Council], far from it.”
Alexander Forbes chief economist Isaah Mhlanga concurred. “The hundred days is not going to be met. There are a couple of things that seem to not be in place,” he said.
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