'It's a challenging period to lead’ - Ramaphosa

Ramaphosa addressed the media at Tuynhuys in Cape Town on Thursday after meeting with a delegation of The Elders.

The delegation included former Ireland president Mary Robinson and chairperson Graça Machel.

Ramaphosa said the discussions centred around the global recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, vaccine equity and climate change.

He admitted the various crises facing South Africa and the rest of the world have made a difficult time for most leaders.

“This is a very difficult time to lead, for any leader around the world, because the world and all countries are really facing complex problems and challenges,” he said.

“We are also facing many of those types of challenges, the after effects of Covid-19 are huge. In our country they have led to two million people losing their jobs in one year. Even much worse than we have experienced in the financial challenges of 2008.”

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Ramaphosa said job losses on such a massive scale would challenge any economy.

“The effort to regain those jobs and begin to grow the economy to a level where it can increase jobs, its huge. So that’s what makes leadership very, very difficult and challenging.”

The July unrest and the recent floods in KZN floods have also added to the country’s woes.

“And in our own situation we have had to deal with the July unrests of last year, which also led to loss of jobs,” Ramaphosa said.

“We are having to deal with the floods of KZN and Eastern Cape. The combination of this means that it’s a challenging period to lead.”