Deputy Speaker, the ailing manufacturing in steel industry and the contraction thereof is one of the greatest contributors to the real risk of the a technical recession in this country. Not enough is being done to protect the steel industry.
ArcelorMittal SA, Amsa, was given tariff protection in 2016 and one of the conditions of implementing the tariff was that a steep price of steel must not be increased to various downstream steel industries - Amsa has increased steel prices seven times since then.
A special committee that was supposed to monitor steel prices after the tariff increase has never even had a