4 November 2008
editorial
Johannesburg — WHAT do we want in a finance minister? It's probably time to start coming to terms with the fact that the one thing we are not going to get is another Trevor Manuel.
After more than a dozen years in the post, Manuel has the kind of authority and experience few, if any, finance ministers have anywhere.
That makes it particularly difficult for South Africans to contemplate a change. And that would be the case even if there were no issues about economic policy and whether or not it was likely to shift, jerk or dance to the left after next year's elections. The Manuel act is, basically, an impossible one to follow. Almost any name is going to cause at least some anxiety in the market.
That makes the appointment of a new deputy finance minister a slightly fraught event anyway, given that many assume that the new deputy will understudy Manuel before replacing him. This is not necessarily the case: it is quite possible that the new deputy will be just a deputy. But it will not help that even though Enoch Godongwana - the man set to be SA's new deputy finance minister - is highly regarded for his strategic, policy and political skills, he is still under a slight cloud, dating back to his days as Eastern Cape's MEC for finance.
Eastern Cape's financial difficulties are so intractable that few political careers can survive there unscathed, and Godongwana, who was sacked in 2004, was no exception. But with a London University masters in financial economics, he has the academic credentials for his new job. And his many years as general secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers , as well as a stint as CE of the Financial Sector Charter Council, give him a skills set that could be useful at the finance ministry. He may not be much of an administrator, but he is a seasoned negotiator who is said to be good at stakeholder management. That could stand the treasury in good stead next year when it has to negotiate budgets with a newly elected Parliament, under new rules that give Parliament a lot more power.
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