Finance minister Enoch Godongwana.(Brenton Geach/Gallo Images via Getty Images)
Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana was forced on Wednesday to delay delivery of the 2025 national budget until 12 March after the cabinet failed to agree on the measures he had proposed.
Announcing the unprecedented decision, National Assembly speaker Thoko Didiza said the lack of consensus may be linked to a two percentage point increase in VAT Godongwana was expected to announce.
“Before we started this session, we were informed by the leader of government business … that while today we have been gathered here to actually have the minister of finance presenting the budget to this august house, that there has not been agreement in terms of parties in the executive to actually find one another in proposals of the budget,” Didiza told parliament.
“There were others who already declared their rejection on what they say is an alleged increase of 2% on the taxes, so they said they wanted to state it upfront that they are not agreeing.
The fact that a VAT hike from the current 15% was widely expected is linked to a rare leak of the budget. Godongwana had confirmed the increase in VAT in a customary embargoed briefing to journalists ahead of his speech to the chamber, which was set for 2pm.
In that earlier media briefing, the minister had also acknowledged that there was a risk that the budget would be met with resistance from within and outside the ruling 10-party government of national unity.
He also said he potentially expected opposition even from within the ranks of the ANC.
Godongwana confirmed that, unusually, the media briefing preceded the cabinet meeting where his budget proposals would be discussed.
He said he was therefore asking journalists to treat his statements with some caution, because the budget had yet to be approved by his colleagues.