Economic development and cost needs to be balanced against and integrated with social and, sometimes, political effects and considerations. This is not unique to South Africa. In this regard government has ensured that we establish the requisite policy framework, its legislative expression, and see to the necessary adjustment to the regulatory framework to ensure both competitiveness and coherence to the principles of fair play. At the same time, my new head of department is hard at work putting in place a revamped structure that will ensure that government has an adequate and professional policy-making, monitoring and evaluation capacity that does not rely overwhelmingly on outside sources. Necessary adjustments also need to be put in place concerning corporate governance, and plans to implement a Corporate Governance Protocol for State-Owned Enterprises are well advanced.
SOEs continue to function and operate within South Africa.
As we undergo the restructuring process, we are acutely aware that what we are doing day by day is putting the necessary blocks in place for further development. Whilst many of the entities can be dealt with relatively easily and rapidly, a number of them, particularly the large state corporations such as Transnet, Eskom, and Denel, require special attention. Furthermore, these three entities, Transnet, Eskom and Denel, along with our telecommunications and information technology instruments, play an important regional, continental and indeed international role. As such they operate in many ways as extensions of South Africa's own foreign policy. This in itself brings certain sensitivities into focus that require our close attention.