Has Team SA delivered in Davos?

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JIMMY MOYAHA: As we’re wrapping up this week, we’re concluding the gathering in Davos, Switzerland – the World Economic Forum gathering that happens annually. We’re going to be reflecting on this and what it is that team SA took there.

I’m joined on the line by the Old Mutual chair Trevor Manuel – who was also the first democratically appointed finance minister of South Africa – to take a look at South Africa’s standing in the global stage and what it is that we achieved this year.

Uncle Trevor, thank you so much for the time. Always lovely having you on our show. What did Team SA take to Davos in 2026?

TREVOR MANUEL: Just for the record, I wasn’t the first. I was the third finance minister in democratic South Africa. Derek Keys and Chris Liebenberg both preceded me. So, just for the record, I don’t want to claim things that that weren’t so.

I think we brought a message here [to Davos] and I think the government representatives especially were very involved in communicating a set of issues.

Last year commitments were made that this year that delegation could come back and say, ‘Okay, let’s take out your list of the issues we spoke about last year and let’s check the boxes’.

Government of national unity, check, still hanging together. The FATF [Financial Action Task Force] grey list, check, we’ve been removed. The EU list, we’ve been removed. The chairing of the G20, we handled that successfully. Ongoing work we can talk about.

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In spite of everything happening, there’s still a bright side to the economy that will allow South Africa to pull into the future.

JIMMY MOYAHA: Uncle Trevor, how was that received on the global stage? You touched on some particularly important factors that were specific to South Africa – the likes of the greylisting, the hosting of the G20, and some of the developments that we had to contend with.

Listen/read: SA faces prospect of not being invited to G20 in Miami – Manuel

I can imagine at the 2025 Davos gathering South Africa took a very different conversation from what we had this year. How was that received from an investor point of view?

TREVOR MANUEL: Let me just set the stage for it. It’s a rather curious gathering of people because there are few things that happen on the big stage in the forum. The bulk of these engagements happen in smaller meetings, persuading people – and frequently bilateral meetings with prospective investors. The only measure you have of this is the interactions at the end of it.

The team, led by Minister Enoch Godongwana, meets on a daily basis to pick up on the meetings they’ve had and their observations, and share them. I think that as we approach the last day, it’s all still very positive.

It’s [important] that your listeners bear in mind that Davos is not a decision-making place. It’s a place where people come and persuade each other of facts.

There’s a lot of discussion that takes place. That’s why it’s a ‘forum’, not like a United Nations institution. You have an amazing reach of people.

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I think what is important – and what I’m going to call the elephant in the room – is the position that President Donald Trump took yesterday in his address, because it was an address to people in the hall, but it was also a global address, and it was very out of character for what happens at Davos.

We’ve got to say it; it’s not pleasant, but we need to know about it.

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JIMMY MOYAHA: Uncle Trevor, can we look at that in a bit more detail? What impact does that then have on the conversations, as you mentioned. This is not a decision-making gathering, but rather one where conversation is encouraged, where relationship-building and relationship-management takes place.

When we have an address like that from the president of one of the most powerful economies on the face of the earth, what does that then do for the rest of the conversations that take place? And how does a country like South Africa navigate that, understanding that we might still have our own separate conversations that need to be had with the United States?

TREVOR MANUEL: Well, there’s very little that that countries would get from that. Just bear in mind that on Tuesday there were two very important speeches – one by Prime Minister Mark Carney of Canada, and the other by President Emmanuel Macron of France.

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Both were positive, forward looking, and tried to capture what is happening in world history. What Prime Minister Carney did was to talk about rupture of the world that we’ve come to know. So that that sets a backdrop for whatever else happens.

I think that many, many of the commentators were completely shocked by the conduct of President Trump because it’s unusual to have that kind of conduct from any high-ranking government official – never mind the president of a country like the United States.

Of course, he also went back in his press conference yesterday to talk about the ‘genocide in South Africa’.

Now, there isn’t a single South African, not even the arch right wingers in South Africa, who believe that to be the truth. But he says it because he separates himself from truth. He lives in a post-truth world, and he thinks that the truth is what he declares it to be. But the rest of the world knows differently.

JIMMY MOYAHA: Uncle Trevor, as we wrap up the conversation, I want to take a look at something else that the rest of the world has been discussing this week in Davos, and that is around where we go from here.

I want to get your thoughts on South Africa’s positioning at the moment. We went to Davos with a clear set of objectives, and part of those objectives includes the ability to attract investments into our economy, to grow our economy.

Are we positioned to take advantage of some of the things that are happening in the world from a transitionary standpoint? I’m talking about the world transitioning into things like critical minerals or artificial intelligence. These conversations have been happening for several years.

Given where South Africa stands currently, are we best positioned to take advantage of these transitions?

TREVOR MANUEL: Look, the way in which I look at this is that it’s not binary. It’s not all or nothing. South Africa has some skills, and there are a lot of things that we don’t adequately utilise. In the broad arena of digitalisation, especially on artificial intelligence, we need to push much harder.

We need to build it into the way in which education happens in South Africa. We need to take calculated risks, and we need to equip the next generation to be more agile in the way they deal with information.

Read: Digital government can benefit citizens

All of us, and you at SAfm and the media in general, I think have a big role to play to ensure that we equip ourselves to deal with a future that is going to be very different from the past. It’s not going to be a light switch. I’m waiting for that light switch, in terms of of analogue, and to have all of our broadcasts in digital format.

That light switch hasn’t happened, but this is not even about that. This is a managed transition to a world that is going to be better for everybody.

JIMMY MOYAHA: A better world, a brighter future, and one that South Africa is poised to take advantage of, especially following the deliverables that we set out to take to the international community at this year’s World Economic Forum gathering.

Listen: WEF 2026: What’s on the agenda?

We’ll leave the conversation on that note. Thanks so much to Old Mutual chair and – rightly corrected – the third democratically elected Finance Minister of South Africa, Trevor Manuel, for joining us to reflect on this year’s World Economic Forum gathering.

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