Where you can watch the 2022 budget speech live
Finance minister Enoch Godongwana will deliver his inaugural budget speech on Wednesday at 14h00.
The budget speech can be viewed through several channels, including TV services like DStv (channel 408), news channels, and live-streaming sources like YouTube.
You can watch the Budget Speech from the following sources:
The speech can also be streamed below:
While analysts broadly anticipate no big surprises or shock revelations, Godongwana still has to balance a long list of demands from various sectors of society.
The minister and National Treasury have faced mounting calls to greenlight and budget for a basic income grant for South Africa, with unions, in particular, calling for the grant to be anywhere between the poverty line (R640 a month) and R1,500.
There have also been calls for the government to come down harder on wealthy individuals by introducing some form of wealth tax to boost the budget for social expenses.
As an antithesis to the call for higher social spending, businesses are petitioning Treasury for a reprieve when it comes to taxes. This call has been chanted loudest by the alcohol and liquor industry, which has asked Godongwana to either skip or limit sin tax hikes for the coming financial year.
The finance minister has also been left to deal with loose threads left by his colleagues in cabinet.
A lingering issue for the last few years is the matter of e-tolls. Transport minister Fikile Mbalula has promised a solution to the mass rejection of the Gauteng toll system for years, however, the matter has ultimately been left in Treasury’s hands.
In November 2021, Mbalula said that whether e-tolls were scrapped or not, South Africans would pay, adding that any decision on the matter had been delayed to the 2022 budget.
Analysts, investors, and economists will also look to Godongwana’s speech for direction on the National Health Insurance and medical aid tax credits; fuel tax hikes amid petrol prices over R20 a litre; and updates on the government wage bill, among others.
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