Two Years of GNU Inertia Leaves Voters Betrayed

These remarks were delivered by ActionSA Parliamentary Leader, Athol Trollip MP, during ActionSA’s 2-year GNU review

Given the government’s own lack of performance management, ActionSA has implemented our own performance framework, the GNU Performance Tracker, which can be found on ActionSA’s website.

The main themes are:

• Ethical Leadership and Public Service,
• Economic Growth that Creates Opportunities,
• Enhance Infrastructure for efficient trade and transport,
• Improve basic services for dignity and quality of life,
• Quality education for all, and
• Law and order that upholds a just society,

which we will cover broadly here today, while the tracker can be accessed for detailed insight into the headlines we will provide today.

Ethical Leadership and Public Service 

Two years ago, South Africans were promised a Government of National Unity that would put the country first.

Instead, they got a Government of National Underperformance.

The very first decision taken by President Ramaphosa after the election was not to streamline government or cut waste. It was to expand it.

The Cabinet grew from 30 Ministers and 36 Deputy Ministers to 32 Ministers and an astonishing 43 Deputy Ministers.

South Africa now has one of the largest and most expensive executive structures in the world. 

Every year taxpayers spend roughly R600 million on the salaries of Ministers, Deputy Ministers and their support staff. R350 million more is spent on travel and accommodation. R4.5 Billion is spent on VIP protection.

When all the perks, protection and support structures are included, this bloated executive costs taxpayers R6 billion annually. 

And if this amount is supposed to represent South Africans’ investment in their leaders, for what return?

A suspended Police Minister embroiled in one of the biggest exposes of infiltration into the highest levels of our police force.

A Minister of Higher Education that lied to Parliament.

A Social Development Minister that hid luxury SUV gifts from Parliament.

An Agriculture Minister whose gross mismanagement of the Foot and Mouth Disease is destroying the livelihoods of our farmers and farm workers.

A policy on AI that hallucinates on the very AI it purportedly addresses.

Weak leadership has become a defining feature of this administration. Whether it is scandals, incompetence, policy drift or a refusal to hold underperforming Ministers accountable, the GNU has consistently failed the test of ethical leadership.

After another year of waste, excuses and declining accountability, ActionSA awards the GNU an F for Ethical Leadership and Public Service.

Economic Growth that Creates Opportunities

If there is one measure by which South Africa’s government should ultimately be judged, it is whether jobs are created.

By that measure, the GNU is failing.

The expanded unemployment rate has risen from 42.6% two years ago to a historic 43.7%.

In the first quarter of 2026 alone, South Africa lost 345,000 jobs.

That means that today, roughly 6,000 South Africans will tell their families that they have lost their livelihoods.

Tomorrow another 6,000 will do the same.

And the day after that, another 6,000.

Behind every statistic is a family wondering how rent will be paid, how food will be bought, and how children will be supported.

Today nearly 12 million South Africans are unemployed.

The reality is that South Africa requires sustained growth of at least 3 to 4 percent a year to meaningfully reduce unemployment.

Instead, growth was just 0.6% in 2024.

Just 1.1% in 2025.

And only 0.5% in the first quarter of 2026.

These are not growth figures.

These are stagnation figures.

And stagnation means unemployment.

Unemployment means poverty.

And poverty means hopelessness.

For that reason, ActionSA’s assessment remains unchanged.

Economic Growth that Creates Opportunities receives an F.

Infrastructure for Trade and Transport

Economic growth cannot happen without functioning infrastructure.

Unfortunately, South Africa’s ports continue to be a national embarrassment.

Cape Town and Durban consistently rank among the worst-performing container ports in the world.

South Africa should be competing with the world’s best ports.

Instead, we are competing to avoid being ranked last.

Freight rail tells a similar story.

The Minister has committed to increasing annual freight volumes significantly by 2029.

Yet current performance remains well below what is required to achieve that target.

And while we welcome the opening up of our railway lines for private sector involvement, it remains to be seen whether this government could implement its plan effectively.

Where there has been progress, we acknowledge it.

Eskom’s energy availability factor has improved over the past two years, and South Africa recently reached one year without load shedding.

That is welcome.

But we do not congratulate a fish for swimming.

We ask why it nearly drowned in the first place.

Because there has been measurable, albeit insufficient, progress in energy and logistics, ActionSA keeps this category at D.

Law and Order

No society can prosper when citizens do not feel safe.

South Africa remains one of the most violent countries in the world.

Although the murder rate has declined, 58 people are still killed every day.

Gender-based violence remains a national crisis.

Every day, women and children continue to live in fear of becoming the next victim.

Recent revelations from the Madlanga Commission and Parliament’s Ad Hoc Committee have exposed something even more alarming: criminal syndicates that have penetrated the highest elements of our law-enforcement institutions.

When organised crime can infiltrate those responsible for fighting crime, public trust collapses.

South Africans deserve better.

They deserve a police service that protects communities rather than being compromised by criminal networks.

They deserve a justice system that punishes criminals rather than empowering them.

For that reason, Law and Order remains an E.

Overall Conclusion

Two years into the Government of National Unity, South Africans were entitled to expect urgency, accountability and results.

Instead, they have received a bigger Cabinet, higher unemployment, failing infrastructure, collapsing educational outcomes and continued insecurity.

There have been isolated improvements.

But isolated improvements are not enough when millions remain unemployed, unsafe and without hope.

South Africans experience outcomes.

And the outcomes after two years are simply not good enough.

ActionSA’s overall assessment is clear: The Government of National Unity has failed to meet the moment. It has failed to deliver the reform agenda South Africans were promised. We therefore rate the GNU’s performance after two years an F.

ActionSA Direct Democracy: Frequently uses digital polls for member input.