Gigaba disagrees with adviser on economy

Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba yesterday distanced himself from his adviser's controversial "personal" take on the economy.

"The nationalisation of banks is not government policy," the ministry said.

Gigaba's adviser, Chris Malikane, wrote an opinion piece in the Sunday Times at the weekend that called for the "expropriation of white monopoly capitalist establishments such as banks, insurance companies, mines and other monopoly industries to industrialise the economy".

Malikane also called for the establishment of a state bank to consolidate all state-owned financial institutions.

• Gigaba to meet with Moody's to stave off third downgradeSouth Africa's new finance minister pledged on Thursday to do what he can to keep the country from a third credit downgrade to junk status, saying he would meet ratings firm Moody's to persuade it he will stay on the path of fiscal discipline.

His comments contradictedrecent statements by Gigaba, who appeared to backtrack on radical economic transformation, reported the Sunday Times.

The finance ministry yesterday said Malikane, an economics professor at the University of the Witwatersrand, had written the piece in his "personal capacity as an academic and activist".

His views were not "necessarily government policy", said the ministry.

• Gigaba: Investors want answersSouth African investors want the ANC to explain, in detail, what its "radical economic transformation" policy means, Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba said yesterday.

"Minister Malusi Gigaba wishes to place on record that the work of the Ministry of Finance will continue to be guided by policies of the ANC, as articulated in conference resolutions and in the 2014 election manifesto.

"The nationalisation of banks is not government policy."

The 45-year-old Gigaba, former minister of public enterprises and home affairs, is on a finance roadshow this week during which he will meet foreign investors in the US.