That today's democratic South Africa was better than apartheid is set to be the thread through Thursday's State of the Nation Address. Sona is the platform for President Cyril Ramaphosa to put his administration in a good light ahead of the high-stakes 2024 election.

Social grants, the National Student Financial Aid Scheme, the national minimum wage, free basic education and healthcare, housing and increased access to basic services like water, electricity and sewage. Expect all these to be ticked in a presidential touting of achievements not just of the past five years, but going back to 1994.

President Cyril Ramaphosa on Thursday evening will want to underscore the governing ANC's track record right from the start of South Africa's democracy which will be 30 years old on 27 April.

The upcoming elections - he may announce a date if the pattern ahead of the 2019 poll holds - are touted as a watershed moment that may see the ANC lose its majority.

Highlighting these social protection measures and benefits is in line with the tone set in the ANC January 8 Statement where the governing party set out its priorities for the year.

This focus in Sona also echoes the ANC styling itself as the defender of democratic gains, sans the party political ideological twists of regime-change victimhood.

Priorities, whether for party or state, haven't changed for some time, although the January 8 Statement on building the family was something of a curveball. But...