Analysing the social justice implications of budget policy statements

Analysing the social justice implications of the Medium Term Budget Policy Statement

The talk will provide an input on key themes emerging from the Medium Term Budget Policy Statement and the in year 2018 budget adjustments from a human rights perspective. The Minister of Finance will have delivered the Medium Term Budget Policy Statement (mini budget speech) the day before.

The Constitution guarantees the progressive realisation of the rights to food, housing, education, health care, water and sanitation, social security, and a clean environment. These obligations should not be set against each other. Worryingly, and despite promises of a ‘stimulus package’, further spending cuts are expected to be announced during the mini budget speech.

We have already seen cuts to the education infrastructure grant funding which we need to prevent more children from dying in pit latrines. The state has crafted an unconstitutional economic trap that is resulting in budget ‘trade-offs’ between its socio-economic rights obligations.

Our speakers

Zukiswa Kota has worked to support social justice and social accountability work since 2009 and is currently the Programme Head of Monitoring and Advocacy at the Public Service Accountability Monitor (PSAM) at Rhodes University. Her work is wide-ranging and includes analysis and tracking of public budgets, monitoring service delivery and undertaking research to support the work of public officials and parliamentarians. An environmental science graduate, her academic research has included an exploration of indigenous plant use in land restoration in the Eastern Cape. Zukiswa is passionate about Africa, its people and its natural assets. She is an incorrigible oenophile, a doting canine parent and a lover of the outdoors.

Thokozile Madonko is currently based at the Heinrich Boll Foundation and is the project coordinator of the Accounting for Basic Services project. She was the coordinator of the Budget Expenditure Monitoring Forum (BEMF) and provided technical support to TAC and SECTION27. Making use of her Master's in Political Theory, she has worked in the areas of public finance with a focus on health financing and gender responsive budgeting, social justice, national, subnational and parliamentary governance, transparency and accountability. She served as organiser for the People’s Health Movement South Africa (PHM-SA). She spent four years at the International Budget Partnership (IBP) as a Programme officer for the IBP’s Zambia partnership initiative and was a Trainer/Technical Assistance Provider in the IBP's training programme. Her love for activism deepened during the four years she worked at the Public Service Accountability Monitor (PSAM) based at Rhodes University, Grahamstown, South Africa, where she worked as a researcher monitoring the performance of the Eastern Cape Provincial Health Department. Her other full time job is parenting an extraordinary rebel girl and by night she writes poetry and book reviews while plotting revolution!