Diversified professional services firm Ernst & Young Africa CEO Ajen Sita has criticised “vague” government policy on tackling Covid-19, calling for more clarity to steer South Africa out of crisis and towards economic recovery.

“We need to decide whether we are going for population immunity – which we may have already nearly achieved – or ramp up vaccination efforts once again. We need a clear strategy, and we need it soon,” he said in a statement on February 7. 

Sita added that a transparent Covid-19 policy would also be of great help to corporate South Africa, which is still adhering to requirements of the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

“While the requirements such as temperature checking and screening questionnaires made sense when we were fighting more virulent strains, it has become an onerous and expensive exercise to keep up observing these practices with no end in sight.

“More certainty for businesses about the future would create confidence to enable planning, spending and hiring,” he said. 

Sita said South Africa needed to “radically and rapidly” get its economy working again. 

An urgent issue that would stabilise the economy was reliable energy and a settled energy policy, which Sita said remained the core challenge for government, failing which South Africa would be unlikely to attract much-needed investment or retain highly skilled workers. 

“While there have been recent concessions by government to allow private electricity generation, there have also been mixed messages,” Sita said.

For example, many citizens and businesses have moved to become more energy independent by installing solar power. However, under State-owned utility Eskom’s new proposed plans for electricity tariffs, this would lead to solar panel users paying more than before, as they would need to pay daily fixed costs to Eskom to be connected to the grid even if they are using their own power, he explained.

Sita also noted that rolling out South Africa’s infrastructure ambitions was now more pressing than ever.

“Infrastructure needs capital, which there seems to be plenty of, as well as commitment and skills. While we are inching towards some of the priority projects, we need to speed up to help plug the [gross domestic product] hole left by lockdowns. These projects will also create large numbers of jobs,” he said, adding that better infrastructure would help boost tourism. 

Sita said that working to revive the South African tourism industry was possibly the most important initiative to boost economic growth.

“South African is the largest tourism economy in Africa and supported more that 15-million jobs while adding R500-billion to the economy before the lockdown. Travel restrictions and fears of contracting Covid-19 have had a devastating effect,” he said.

He noted, however, that travel restrictions in many countries have already been lifted and that there was significant appetite to travel again.

“We need to stand up and wave with both hands to tell people to come and visit,” Sita quipped.

He noted that foreigner tourist numbers to locations such as Cape Town recovered over the December 2021 holiday season.

“We need global marketing campaigns to grab peoples’ attention. Rising numbers of tourists, and particularly more affluent tourists, will have an almost instant impact on job creation that will have a multiplier effect through the economy,” Sita said. 

He asserted that, as the threat of Covid-19 faded, South Africa needed to focus on restoration and growth. He added that a more stable social and economic environment should be used as a foundation to “climb out of the slump of the past two years”.

“Now it is clearly time for South Africa to take proactive steps to restart the economy and aim to exceed where we were two years ago,” Sita concluded.