Picture: RSA president, Cyril Ramaphosa
By KEDIBONE MOLAETSI
24 August 2026 – The Republic of South Africa (RSA) president, Cyril Ramaphosa said last week, they launched the third phase of the partnership between government and business to drive faster inclusive economic growth and create jobs. Ramaphosa said this partnership is but one example of the collaborative initiatives that the government has with social partners such as labour, business and civil society.
He further said over the last few years, they have forged partnerships across society to tackle a number of economic and social challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic and Gender-Based Violence (GBV) to reviving and building key industries. Ramaphosa added that when they established the government-business partnership in 2023, the country faced severe crises that threatened economic progress.
“Load shedding, freight logistics constraints and persistent security challenges weighed heavily on businesses, workers and households alike. We recognised that while the state must set policy, regulate and deliver public goods, the expertise and resources of the private sector are critical if we are to build a resilient economy.
“Together, we resolved to address our nation’s most binding economic constraints. While the first two phases of the partnership were about stabilisation and structural reform, the third phase focuses on areas of the economy that can stimulate greater growth and job creation,” he said.
Ramaphosa said when they started, their immediate objective was to respond to the crises in electricity and logistics. He said they brought on board private sector capabilities through the National Energy Crisis Committee and undertook joint efforts in freight transport to halt the decline in these critical network industries.
“We mobilised support from business for the structural reforms that the government had embarked on and drew on its resources to build institutional capacity in the state. This work, together with the efforts of the relevant government departments and public entities, has helped us to achieve more than 400 days without load shedding.
“This has been possible thanks to a remarkable turnaround in generation led by Eskom, a rapid expansion in private generation capacity and significant progress toward a competitive electricity market. Operational performance at key ports has been strengthened through strategic partnerships and freight rail corridors have now been opened to private operators,” said Ramaphosa.
He said the partnership has also contributed to South Africa’s removal from the Financial Action Task Force grey list, prompting credit rating agencies to upgrade their outlooks and ratings for the country. Ramaphosa said these are real outcomes that demonstrate that social partnerships are more than meetings and presentations.
“They are practical, delivery-focused mechanisms that achieve measurable results. While the work done to date has laid a firm foundation, our growth rate remains too low to absorb the millions of South Africans seeking work.
“With around 8.5 million unemployed citizens by the official rate and roughly 300,000 net new work-seekers entering the labour force each year, we must accelerate our pace. The third phase of the partnership sets a clear target of lifting South Africa’s GDP growth above 3% a year and contributing toward the creation of one million new jobs by 2030,” he said.
The Guardian 