Parliament to release detailed costs of Godongwana’s budget speeches

National Assembly Speaker, Thoko Didiza making opening remarks during the an Orientation and Induction Programme for MPs held at Century City, Cape Town on
July 2, 2024

2 minutes

National Assembly (NA) Speaker Thoko Didiza says Parliament will comply with the request and share the full cost of tabling two budget speeches by Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana in writing.

This comes after the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) asked for a cost analysis of the money spent on the two previous budget speeches.

During the National Assembly Programming Committee meeting on Thursday, Parliament said the costs it bore were for the facilities it needed for the sittings.

The venue, the Niewmeester Dome, is the responsibility of the Department of Public Works.

The EFF also wants this department to provide a cost analysis.

African National Congress (ANC) Chief Whip Mdumiseni Ntuli disagrees with this and says some of the facts around what happened during the previous budget processes are being manipulated.

Ntuli says, “I’m saying the facts are being manipulated or distorted in a sense that I cannot understand why members of this committee would say that there has to be somebody taking personal responsibility, especially for the sitting on the 12th.”

“The one that could not take place in February, I understand that concern and I fully agree with your response speaker that written response will be made including to public works that will provide their own information as well, but I am concerned that the argument relating to the 12th in my own view doesn’t hold because we had a sitting on that day,” he adds.