Ramaphosa delivered his address on Thursday evening.

His plan for the country includes a new social compact in 100 days, regulatory reform to cut small business red tape, measures to assist small businesses, and secure stable electricity.

DA leader John Steenhuisen says, for the first time, Ramaphosa said some right things. 

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But he wants Ramaphosa to now commit to implementation.

“He has made the right noises in the past too, only to go missing when they had to be implemented. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and so we caution all South Africans to hold the applause until these announcements become actions, if they ever do.

“His realisation, decades too late, that ‘government doesn’t create jobs; businesses create jobs...government must create the conditions that will enable the private sector' is a considerable departure from his party’s central control-obsessed approach to the economy and jobs. And he is entirely correct in this new assessment. But until he walks the walk by significantly reforming labour legislation and by downsizing his bloated public sector with its thousands of millionaire managers, that will just remain talk’,” says Steenhuisen.

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Steenhuisen said Ramaphosa should also consider replacing some members of his cabinet.

“It is time the president took a leaf from the DA’s book on getting things done. But to do so, he would also need to get rid of almost his entire cabinet and he would need to walk away from cadre deployment for good. Because until then, all of this will just be talk.

“Judged by the words alone, this is a commendable SONA. But words mean nothing until you put them into action. And so we will reserve our assessment until we see movement on all these issues.”