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Minister in the Presidency Trevor Manuel. Photo: GCIS
Durban – For the media the National Development Plan “was not scandalous enough to make front page news”, Planning Minister Trevor Manuel said at the opening session of the 15th African Renaissance Conference in Durban on Thursday.
Manuel’s retort was in response to criticism that the plan was not being communicated and was not yet part of the nation’s psyche.
Steuart Pennington, noted speaker and chief executive of South Africa: The Good News, said there did not seem to be a concerted effort by the government to sell the vision to the nation. Every South African, especially teachers, needed to know what the NDP was about, Pennington said.
Manuel admitted more needed to be done to make ordinary people aware of the plan, but said the media needed to play a bigger part.
“The plan is there and now it is about transferring ownership. It is not owned by the 26 commissioners on the National Planning Commission, but needs to be owned by the nation,” he said.
Manuel said the plan had the full support of all political parties, despite being unpopular in some quarters, in what was clearly a reference to Cosatu.
The union federation has castigated the plan for being too “pro-business” and has claimed it is an adaptation of the government’s Gear (Growth, Employment and Redistribution) strategy of the 1990s.
General-secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa), Irvin Jim, has dubbed the plan a “right-wing” strategy borrowed from the DA.
“There are those who reject the NDP without proposing an alternative, and their criticism comes in ideological language. They don’t provide workable solutions,” Manuel said.
Bheki Sibiya, the chief executive of the Chamber of Mines, who said he was speaking in his personal capacity, said the “noises from the unions” were disturbing and he questioned if there had been enough consultation in the plan’s development.
Manuel said achieving the plan was like running the Comrades Marathon and would require effort and dogged determination. The plan’s long-term vision included bringing down unemployment to 14 percent by 2020 and 6 percent by 2030. This required an average growth rate of 5.4 percent over the next 17 years.
The Mercury
