South Africa's Budget Crisis Would Cause Early Elections In Other Countries: Julius Malema

Economic Freedom Fighters EFF leader Julius Malema maintains that South Africa does not have a budget, adding that this crisis would have caused an early election in other countries.

Speaking at his partys Freedom Day event in the Free State on Sunday 27 April, Malema also described the government of national unity GNU as illegitimate.

Nowhere in the history of the world has a country been able to operate without a budget. In other countries, the crisis we are in would have led to an early election because without a budget, there is no government, the EFF leader said.

The day the ANC African National Congress passed a budget illegally, that was the day this government collapsed.

Parliament is yet to vote on a Rates Bill gazetted by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana that seeks to reverse a 0.5 percentage-point increase in value added tax VAT.

The increase was set to take effect on 1 May, but it is not clear if Parliament will be able to adopt the Bill before then. The EFF and Democratic Alliance DA have thus filed supplementary affidavits in their anti-VAT increase case at the Western Cape high court.

They are seeking a specific court order stopping the hike before 1 May, arguing that Godongwanas reversal of the VAT increase means Parliament must restart the budget process afresh.

Malema slammed the GNUs three-month failure to pass a budget. This is an illegitimate government. You cannot be a genuine government without a legitimate budget, he said.

There is no budget because Godongwana has withdrawn the Division of Revenue Bill and the Appropriations Bill, meaning he has to create a fiscal framework to introduce these Bills again.

Godongwana said he will introduce new versions of the Bill in the next few weeks. This is because the VAT hike reversal necessitates expenditure adjustments.