For Immediate Press Release

SONA 2026: 11 February 2026

The TCOE SONA Media Statment026

As the country eagerly awaits yet another State of the Nation Address, it is expected that the president will not only scratch the surface of the complexity of structural problems facing the country but take us into confidence on the plan of GNU towards addressing socio-economic problems. As an organisation we note the 2026 State of the Nation Address within the context of deepening social, economic and ecological crisis. We wonder if the state of the nation address by President Ramaphosa will symbolize a continuation of what the Human Rights Commission referred to as “a shameful symbol of a national disaster” i.e. the death of children in South Africa due to malnutrition.

Poverty and hunger are linked to a complex web of issues underlying the country’s economy that range from income opportunities and social justice to mention but few. When South Africa transitioned into a democratic country, our government carried both political and constitutional mandate to address racialized inequalities by developing policies and programmes to ensure that the country truly belongs to all who live in it. However, it is disturbing to note that inequalities have been deepening with growing fraction of black elites getting their share of economic benefits whilst most of the black working class continue to be trapped in vicious cycle of poverty. Social grants provide survival, not dignity. In the absence of meaningful state support, rural families are forced to depend and survive on informal safety nets, small food gardens, borrowing from loan sharks, and unstable seasonal work.

The lived reality of rural households, women, farmworkers, small-scale farmers and the working class stands in sharp contradiction to repeated policy commitments made over the past three SONAs. Fiscal austerity measures have meant continued budget cuts on social spending thus affecting the poor people’s access to decent health, education and other essential social services. Rural women and children continue to carry the cost of policy failure.

Official unemployment figures remain among the highest globally, with ^[1]youth unemployment disproportionately affecting young Black women. Rural economies have been systematically neglected. Government employment schemes remain short-term and do not alter ownership patterns or economic structures.

Landlessness is economic exclusion. Without secure land with water access, rural women cannot produce food at scale, generate income, or build local economies. The One Woman, One Hectare campaign is not symbolic, it represents a structural intervention capable of addressing unemployment, food insecurity and gender inequality simultaneously.

If even a fraction of underutilised state land were redistributed to women farmers with secure water rights, support infrastructure and market access, thousands of livelihoods could be created. Instead, land reform budgets remain marginal within the national fiscus, while agricultural subsidies continue to favour large commercial producers.

We call for 2026 SONA to address the following key development areas:

• A significant increase in the land reform budget with prioritisation of women’s land with water access [One Woman One Hectare].
• Redistribution of underutilised state land to small-scale women farmers
• Secure water rights linked to land reform.
• Democratic participation of rural women in land and climate decision-making bodies
• Comprehensive economic development plan that will generate sustainable job opportunities.
• Review rural development strategy that focuses on real local opportunities as opposed to private sector driven extractivism.
• Capacitate local government to deal with disaster risk management
• Compensation system for small -scale farmers towards loss and damage as a result of climate disaster
• Adoption of agroecological approach and policy for food production

[1] young people aged 15 to 34 make up roughly 50,2% : https://www.statssa.gov.za/?p=18398