Legalise pot to fill the hole in budget, Mboweni says

South African Finance Minister Tito Mboweni has high hopes that legalising the marijuana industry can help plug the nation’s yawning revenue shortfall.

Tweeting from his farm in Magoebaskloof in the northeastern Limpopo province on Sunday, Mboweni said he urgently needed to raise more tax and decriminalising cannabis could help accomplish that goal.

Mboweni is due to outline plans to contain spending and bolster income in his annual budget speech on February 26. Power shortages have constrained growth, and as a result the National Treasury is confronting a R52.5 billion revenue shortfall for the year through March.

Mboweni previously tweeted that legalising marijuana could add more than R4 billion to the economy. The finance minister also uses his feed to comment on economic policy and give cooking tips to his more than 507 000 followers.

While South Africa’s Constitutional Court legalised the private use and cultivation of marijuana in 2018, it remains illegal to buy and sell it.

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