Each year the Minister of Finance asks you to send him your tips on what you would like to see included in the Budget. The person who submits the best tip, as decided by the National Treasury, wins a two-year subscription to Personal Finance magazine.
This year’s winner is Mandisa Motha-Ngumla, a senior manager at the South African Revenue Service in Pretoria, who sent in the following tip: “Government must teach its people to fish, not be suppliers of fish. The latter is not sustainable; the government pond will never be able to supply more fish in 20 years than it is doing now to the ever-growing masses of people of this country. Let’s work to reduce dependency and give back dignity that was eroded by our past.”
Talking to Personal Finance, Motha-Ngumla said: “The figure of 24 percent unemployment of South Africa’s healthy, working-age population is a clear indication of this state of paralysis, and this is reinforced by the fact that the tax base is constituted of only about six million people, in a country with a population of over 50 million.”
She says she felt that this year’s Budget was very strong on job creation.