South Africa’s new President Cyril Ramaphosa will make the State Of The Nation Address in Parliament later today (Friday) laying out his government’s legislative program for the year ahead.
Expectations are sky-high on the man who succeeds the corruption-plagued Jacob Zuma who was effectively sacked by the ruling African National Congress.
President Cyril Ramaphosa adopted a mood of humility for his first day in South Africa’s top job which he has wanted since moving into party politics a quarter of a century ago.
He will have to apply the toughness he developed as as leader of the powerful National Union of Mineworkers and the acumen polished as a billionaire businessman when he took a break from politics.
The far left Economic Freedom Fighters, whose members walked out of the Assembly to avoid participating in his unopposed election as President, have vowed to participate robustly in the SONA debate.
And Leader Of The Opposition Mmusi Maimane has warned his Democratic Alliance will hold Ramaphosa to account for the problems of low growth, high unemployment and rampant poverty facing South Africa.
Ramaphosa will reply to the debate next Tuesday ahead of Wednesday’s Budget.
Whether he will leave Zuma’s appointed Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba to introduce this or whether he will put his own choice of minister into the job in the eleventh hour is the million rand political question of the moment.
Ramaphosa to make State Of The Nation Address
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Jean-Jacques Cornish is a journalist and broadcaster who has been involved in the media all his adult life.
Starting as a reporter on his hometown newspaper, he moved briefly to then Rhodesia before returning to South Africa to become a parliamentary correspondent with the South African Press Association. He was sent to London as Sapa’s London editor and also served as special correspondent to the United Nations. He joined the then Argus group in London as political correspondent.
Returning to South Africa after 12 years abroad, he was assistant editor on the Pretoria News for a decade before becoming editor of the Star and SA Times for five years.
Since 1999 he’s been an independent journalist writing and broadcasting – mainly about Africa – for Talk Radio 702 and 567 Cape
Talk, Radio France International, PressTV, Radio Live New Zealand, Business Day, Mail & Guardian, the BBC, Agence France Press,
Business in Africa, Leadership, India Today, the South African Institute for International Affairs and the Institute for Security Studies.
He has hosted current affairs talk shows on Talk Radio 702 and 567 Cape Talk. He appears as an African affairs pundit on SABC Africa and CNBC Africa.
He lectured in contemporary studies to journalism students at the Tshwane University of Technology and the University of Pretoria.
He speaks on African affairs to corporate and other audiences.
He has been officially invited as a journalist to more than 30 countries. He was the winner of the 2007 SADC award for radio journalism.
He’s been a member of the EISA team observing elections in Somaliland, Democratic Republic of Congo, Madagascar, Zimbabwe, Egypt and Tunsiai.
In October 2009 he headed a group of 39 African journalists to the 60th anniversary celebrations of the Peoples’ Republic of China.
In January 2010 he joined a rescue and paramedical team to earthquake struck Haiti.
He is immediate past president of the Alliance Francaise of Pretoria.
Jean-Jacques is a director of Giant Media. The company was given access to Nelson Mandela in his retirement years until 2009.
He is co-producer of the hour-long documentary Mandela at 90 that was broadcast on BBC in January 2009.
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