SONA 2024: Open letter to President Ramaphosa

In February 2024 ahead of the State of the Nation Address (SONA), 15 organisations including the Children's Institute wrote an open letter to South African Present Cyril Ramaphosa that called on him to deliver a bold SONA that aligned policy across government. 

The letter read:

"Dear My President,

RE: SONA and National Budget 2024

2024 is a watershed moment for South Africa. This year will mark the thirtieth anniversary of South Africa’s constitutional democracy and the seventh time South African citizens will exercise their democratic rights in a general election. As you finalise your State of the Nation Address (SONA), the last you will deliver to this sixth democratic parliament, we do not doubt that you too are reflecting on these milestones. In this historic moment, we call on you to align government’s policy and implementation efforts behind the needs of the country’s marginalised people and place these at the centre of the SONA.

We call on you to ensure that government speaks with one voice, coherently advancing and funding stated policy priorities. This would ensure that the advancement of constitutional rights is prioritised in key government plans and budgets. Policy coherence requires the alignment of efforts across cabinet, and in particular between stated policy priorities and the National Budget being tabled later this month. Such alignment cannot be successful if the Minister of Finance and National Treasury continue to act unilaterally, undermining programmes that are constitutional entitlements and stated government policy.

In recent years, we have observed that while the SONA has made certain commitments, National Treasury has either failed to resource these programmes or has deliberately cut funding to them without any accountability. In 2023, National Treasury unilaterally issued instructions to all departments and state entities to make widespread and devastating budget cuts, later repudiated by cabinet. National Treasury continues to pursue hyper-austerity in critical economic and social services. This curtails the realisation of socio-economic rights, hampers economic growth, and undermines the gains made through recent government interventions."

Read the open letter in full.