The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) notes and welcomes the intervention by the Industrial Development Corporation (IDC) in Tongaat Hulett, which has created an opportunity to preserve one of South Africa’s most strategic agricultural and industrial assets.
A last-minute agreement between the IDC, Vision Sugar Group and Tongaat Hulett’s business rescue practitioners has averted the liquidation of Tongaat Hulett Limited. The deal followed the withdrawal of the liquidation application in the Durban High Court and allows the company to remain in business rescue while a restructuring and transfer of operations is finalised.
Under the agreement, the IDC will turn about R2.5 billion it has already provided after the company ran into trouble into shares in Vision Sugar Group’s regional business. This will give the IDC roughly a 25% ownership stake across operations in South Africa, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Botswana. Vision Sugar Group, led by South African Robert Gumede and Zimbabwean Rute Moyo, will take over day-to-day management and bring together ownership of the different parts of the business.
In South Africa, the group and its partners will control about 68% of the operations.The company will also work on paying off creditors and restructuring Tongaat Hulett into a broader regional sugar business. Beyond safeguarding jobs and productive capacity, the agreement protects critical industrial infrastructure from liquidation and asset stripping, preserves South Africa’s domestic sugar production capabilities, and secures the continued participation of black farmers and rural communities in the sugar economy. The intervention demonstrates the strategic role that developmental finance institutions can play in preserving industries that are vital to food security, rural development, manufacturing and economic sovereignty.
The sugar sector remains a critical source of employment and economic activity. The company operates key sugar mills and refining infrastructure that support thousands of workers, contractors and suppliers across KwaZulu-Natal and neighbouring countries. It is estimated that approximately 250,000 livelihoods throughout the sugar value chain depend on the continued operation of Tongaat Hulett, including more than 15,000 predominantly black small-scale sugar cane growers who rely on the company’s milling operations to process and market their produce.
Therefore, any intervention that protects productive capacity and safeguards jobs in this sector must be welcomed. The IDC’s intervention also reaffirms the important role that state development finance institutions must play in driving industrialisation and supporting strategic sectors of the economy.
However, this intervention once again exposes a deeper structural problem in South Africa. There is no coherent industrial strategy guiding state-led investment and industrial development. Without a clear national industrial agenda, interventions of this nature risk being reactive and fragmented, rather than part of a deliberate programme of re-industrialising South Africa.
The EFF has consistently maintained that the IDC must return to its original developmental mandate, which is to finance productive industries that expand manufacturing capacity, deepen beneficiation, and create sustainable jobs. The IDC cannot continue to divert critical capital into sectors and projects that do little to advance industrialisation, including private healthcare infrastructure, hotels, and commercial property developments.
These investments may generate returns, but they do not fundamentally transform the productive structure of the economy. In many instances, they merely deepen the parasitic commercialisation of essential public services and entrench profit extraction from basic human needs.
We maintain that the only sustainable and long-term solution for strategic companies such as Tongaat Hulett is direct state intervention through public ownership or strategic nationalisation. The same approach should be applied to companies such as ArcelorMittal South Africa, whose collapse or decline poses serious risks to industrial capacity and economic sovereignty.
Strategic sectors must be protected through state ownership and integrated with capable investors who possess both the financial capacity and industrial expertise to strengthen upstream and downstream value chains. That is the only path towards genuine re-industrialisation, economic sovereignty and sustainable job creation.
The EFF has a strong presence in student politics, particularly on university campuses.
Kill Switch
There was a German, an Italian and Van der Merwe on death row.The warden gave them a choice of three ways to die:
1. to be shot
2. to be hung
Bufffreak
Melktert – milk tart. One of South Africa’s most popular desserts consisting of a sweet pastry crust and a creamy milk filling, topped with cinnamon powder. Absolutely delicious!