BL Premium reports that Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana has given the assurance the budget cuts to be announced in the medium-term budget policy statement (MTBPS) will be “moderate” and will not exceed normal government underspending in previous years.

There have been fears, given SA’s deteriorating fiscal position of low growth, low revenue and high borrowing costs, that the National Treasury will announce deep budget cuts in the MTBPS that will harm service delivery. In comments made to parliament’s finance committee on Tuesday, the minister said budget cuts would be below the underspending of R28bn by all spheres of government in 2022/23. In 2021/22, government underspending amounted to R36bn. His comments came after an open letter to him and President Cyril Ramaphosa by more than 100 academics, economists, professionals and civil society organisations called for a halt to all planned budget cuts. The Treasury has issued guidelines to government departments on how they can cut spending. Government exceeded the expenditure provided for in the February budget, which did not take into account the public sector wage agreement that added R37.4bn to spending.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Linda Ensor at BusinessLive (subscriber access only)

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