"I felt that people were disappointed. I think the president said very little; he didn't deal with the tough issues that confronted his government," Leon said outside the National Assembly building after the speech yesterday.
Mbeki had quite understandably taken credit for that which had been done right, but he had failed to also take responsibility for what had gone wrong.
Instead, he had said it was all a problem of the apartheid-era inheritance, and of resources.
"The truth is, we have seven million South Africans who are sick or dying of HIV Aids. They got one sentence in the speech.
"We've a real full-blown crisis in Zimbabwe; not a word in the speech, and we have big, big issues with unemployment, and the president said 'we're going to give you more of the same'.
"Well, more of the same will mean another million people out of work in the next five years".
The reality was the government had penalised job creation and the employer with the new labour laws, and this was the real joblessness problem.
The fact that the president did not accept this was a "very, very big disappointment". – Sapa.
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