Maimane feels state not up to running parastatals alone

 DA leader Mmusi Maimane believes the state is not competent to run State Owned Entities (SOEs) on its own and called for their partial privatisation.

This he said at the Daily Dispatch Dialogues discussing opposition politics into the future at the City Life Church in Quigney, East London.

Maimane suggested that government's 100% control of SOEs was hampering their progress and causing the taxpayers to suffer with the endless bailouts.

In this regard, now was the time to privatise for greater equity.

"SOEs do not do well because they have the rich uncle called the state," said Maimane.

"What I am proposing is that we must start a gradual process where SOEs have a greater equity share.

"We cannot carry on with directors appointed by government but we need private directors too which means at the likes of SAA we will stop having the dictatorship of Dudu Myeni."

According to Maimane, SOEs were in a state of chaos because there was no accountability since an incapable state was running the show.

"There are areas such as SOEs where the state is not competent to do certain things," he said.

“The ownership of SOEs cannot continue being one where the taxpayer foots the bill for losses that could have been avoided."

With regards to Eskom, Maimane is of the view that the power utility cannot cope to build power stations and do the distribution.

The ideal scenario, suggested Maimane, is to have Eskom focused only on building while a different entity should do the distribution.

“What will that do is to allow competition which in turn will give consumers a better choice.”