Wise words are not enough to fix South Africa’s economy

TWO DAYSANCGDP before he outlined South Africa’s budget, Tito Mboweni shared a Photoshopped picture of himself in a spacesuit. The caption read: “man on a mission”. It was characteristic skylarking by the finance minister, an ebullient reformer who spends much of his time warning colleagues in the ruling African National Congress () that unless the economy is overhauled the country faces ruin.On February 26th political gravity brought Mr Mboweni down to earth. His budget was billed as the most important since the end of apartheid in 1994. South Africa’s public finances are in a sorry state, a result of sluggish growth and lavish state spending, especially on public-sector wages. Debt was just 27% of in 2008. A decade later it was 57%, and is set to rise to 66% over the next year, warned the finance minister. But it is unlikely that his comrades were paying attention.