CEO Neren Rau SACCI South Africa has celebrated a successful government election. SACCI’s election observers found the Independent Electoral Commission to be generally efficient, and the stations observed were characterised by a positive atmosphere.

It is not just the right to vote, but the context in which voting takes place that makes a citizen proud to be South African. A free and fair election and a result that is reflective of the will of the majority of South Africans are essential prerequisites for the conduct of business and for favourable investor interest in South Africa. As eagerly anticipated as the election outcomes are, so are the policies of the new administration. For almost a year prior to the elections, rumours of moves from the moderate left to the far left abounded. For business, the fear was a less favourable policy environment in deteriorating economic circumstances. The first post-election speeches and interviews indicate support for a new, unified approach to South Africa’s challenges under the guidance of a leadership that will take its commitments to all South Africans seriously and engender actions and policies that will go to the heart of these challenges. There are also commitments to put the past behind us and to take a considered and critical view of the weaknesses within government structures and how they may be addressed in the interests of effective delivery. In looking for an assessment of international sentiment toward local political developments, analysts and journalists turn to the securities markets and the exchange rate. While movements in these financial indicators sometimes display small, temporary reactions to political events in South Africa, SACCI is of the view that financial indicators are, in current times, predominantly influenced by global economic events and cannot be considered reliable indicators of international sentiment toward local events. What would be expected from a new government to win the favour of local business as well as foreign interest? • Initially, an adherence to the economic policies that have mitigated the impact of the global economic crisis on South Africa; • a consultative, managed approach to the development and introduction of new policies that will impact the business environment. While there is no doubt that the new administration would want to introduce policy improvements, such changes must be introduced in a manner that is sensitive to the current plight of business and that affords business sufficient opportunity to adapt to the new policies; and • although President Barack Obama may have created a precedent for the early introduction of economic stimulus programmes in response to the global crisis, the lead up to the elections indicates that a dramatic South African stimulus package is unlikely to be tabled in the immediate term. There is no doubt that policies which address the plight of the poverty-stricken and sections of the workforce that have suffered in this crisis will predominate. Although SACCI supports such policies, it believes that these challenges may be addressed through a policy framework that also supports a conducive environment for business. The path to socio-economic development need not lie in trade-offs or in prejudicing the interests of one economic stakeholder over another, but in policies that balance and synergise the needs of all economic stakeholders. The introduction of SACCI’s policy radar tool in its recently launched Quarterly Review is an intuitive, diagrammatic depiction of how areas key to business in the policy environment evolve over time. The six broad focus areas of the policy radar (crime and security, environment, labour, ICT, ease of doing business, and infrastructure) are aligned to the mandates of the SACCI policy committees. The assessments of the six focus areas are underpinned by scoring a series of key issues considered to influence the broad focus areas. The introduction of the first policy radar just prior to the elections cements its value as a baseline for policy assessment over the term of the new political administration.