S.Africa contingency reserves won’t be spent on Eskom, Transnet, finance minister says

South Africa will use future drawdowns of its Gold and Foreign Exchange Contingency Reserve Account to curb its debt burden, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana said, adding he was pondering tax hikes and expenditure cuts in the next post-election budget. Africa's most industrialised nation is grappling with an ailing economy and high debt ahead of a general election on May 29 that could see the governing African National Congress party lose its parliamentary majority for the first time since the end of apartheid 30 years ago. "Eskom is out, or Transnet," Godongwana told Reuters on the sidelines of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meeting, ruling out financial support from the account for the country's ailing state-energy firms.