President Jacob Zuma’s budget-busting plan for free higher education set off a flurry of panic among senior government officials this week‚ even prompting threats by a senior National Treasury official to resign should the proposal go ahead‚ the Sunday Times reports.
It said the president had planned to announce the R40-billion free education plan on Tuesday last week ‚ but held off amid warnings from officials that such a move would plunge South Africa into an economic crisis.
It also emerged this week that Zuma had initially wanted to announce the plan during his state of the nation address in February‚ but had been forced into a humiliating climb-down after shocked senior officials at the Treasury and in the Presidency scrambled to put the brakes on it‚ the newspaper reported.
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