Business Unity SA (Busa) on Thursday called for certainty in the business environment following the establishment of the new administration.
”What we’ve had recently is not a Cabinet reshuffle — new departments have now been created.
”Business needs to know who will do what — it needs to know which door to knock on,” Busa deputy CEO Raymond Parsons told the Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of SA’s annual conference in Johannesburg.
He noted that South African business wanted predictability and certainty on which to base its decisions.
It also required clarity on the new government appointments. However, Parsons said he believed clarity would soon be provided by President Jacob Zuma.
”When the Polokwane conference took place, the economy was growing at 5%, but the global crisis has turned the situation around,” he said.
This meant that opportunities had to be revisited, options narrowed and issues reprioritised.
He stressed that South Africa now had to make fewer mistakes when considering policies, as ”mistakes could be costly in the present environment”.
Turning to the global financial crisis, Parsons said South Africa was a victim of a situation not of its own making.
”And we are still in the middle of a synchronised downturn — forget about the idea of decoupling,” he said. – Sapa