Ramaphosa wants big business to make NHI work

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa asked the country’s biggest business lobby group to submit proposals on its concern with a recent law that will lay the groundwork for universal national health insurance.

The president has requested Business Unity South Africa “put forward specific proposals on the remaining issues of concern as a basis for further engagement,” the presidency said in a statement Tuesday after Ramaphosa met with the lobby’s leadership. 

“Government remains committed to engaging with all stakeholders in good faith on the process of health-care reform and to finding workable solutions that will advance quality and affordable health care for all,” the presidency said.   

BUSA has previously described the plan as unaffordable and unconstitutional. It’s also said the “legislation, in its current form, is unimplementable and damaging to the country’s health-care sector, to the economy more broadly and to investor confidence.” 

The NHI Act, which was spearheaded by the African National Congress and signed into law less than two weeks before it lost its outright majority in the May 29 elections, aims to fix South Africa’s dysfunctional health system and make access to treatment more equitable while banning the private sector from insuring treatment covered under the plan.