Two top positions in the National Treasury, which have been vacant for several years, are to be filled, Cabinet announced on Thursday. 

Minister in the Presidency Mondli Gungubele said Cabinet had approved the appointment of Shabeer Hamid Khan as Accountant General and Mendoe Ntswahlana as Chief Procurement Officer. Khan was previously the chief financial officer of the department of trade, industry, and competition, and Ntswahlana was a deputy director-general in the Eastern Cape provincial treasury. 

The director-general in the Treasury Dondo Mogajane’s contract ends next week after a 23-year career in government. Gungubele said that Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana was in the process of finding a replacement. 

The Treasury, which suffered a large exodus of staff over the past 10 years, is slowly being rebuilt as Godongwana moves to fill vacancies, beginning with the most senior level.

Gungubele also said that discussions between government, business, and labour on a new social compact were “intense” and that there was a desire among the parties to find each other.

In his State of the Nation address in February, President Cyril Ramaphosa said he wanted to secure the compact within 100 days. So far, 75 days have passed, and Gungubele said that Ramaphosa was indicating the urgency with which he wanted the task done. 

"We have not set new timeframes. The concern is we must finish this thing," he said. 

Government has no new announcement to make on measures to mitigate the fuel price increase next month, he said, which is expected to be other R3/litre once the full fuel levy is returned to the price.

For the past two months, government gave consumers a R1.50/litre holiday on fuel tax, but this was a measure for limited time only.

Gungubele says that work is being done to find longer term relief for consumers.