Sona: BIG move by Ramaphosa?

BUSINESS NEWS - South Africa’s current social relief of distress (SRD) grant will serve as a foundation from which a more sustainable form of income support will be implemented, said President Cyril Ramaphosa during his 2025 State of the Nation Address (Sona).

The president was delivering his speech from the City Hall in Cape Town on Thursday evening at a joint sitting of the National Assembly and the National Council of Provinces.

“The Social Relief of Distress Grant is … an essential mechanism for alleviating extreme poverty. We will use this grant as a basis for the introduction of a sustainable form of income support for unemployed people,” he noted.

According to the president, the government spends around 60% of the national budget on the social wage – health, education, social protection, community development and public employment programmes.

“More than 28 million unemployed and vulnerable people receive social grants.”

Ramaphosa did not elaborate on possible sources of funding or an implementation date for the “more sustainable income support”, but his remarks correspond with the ANC’s earlier pronouncements on implementing a universal basic income grant (BIG).

Moneyweb reported earlier that the ANC, in a leaked document, outlined its plans for a BIG to be implemented this year.

The ANC made a similar undertaking in May last year, mere days before the national and provincial elections, noting that it was committed to instituting a basic income grant in South Africa and that the grant will be financed by new progressive tax measures, among others.

Court ruling on SDR grant

In a recent court ruling, the government was ordered to “progressively increase” the grant and income threshold. In the ruling, it was also found that some SRD grant regulations were unconstitutional.

The ruling came after civil society groups the #PayTheGrants campaign and the Institute of Economic Justice (IEJ) challenged the government’s SRD grant regulations in October 2024.

They argued the rules deployed by government to qualify for the grant exclude millions of potentially eligible South Africans.

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