South African president says new coalition government is united in tackling unemployment and poverty

abcnews.go.com:

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has opened a new parliamentary term

CAPE TOWN, South Africa — South African President Cyril Ramaphosa opened a new parliamentary term Thursday, nearly two months after an historic election result reshaped the country's politics and led to the formation of an unprecedented multiparty government coalition.

Ramaphosa's speech to lawmakers at the City Hall in Cape Town — a replacement venue after a fire gutted the Parliament building two years ago — marked the official start of business for the new coalition, which brings at least 10 parties together to govern Africa's most industrialized country.

Ramaphosa said that despite the political differences of his diverse government, it was united in tackling South Africa's three biggest problems: an unemployment crisis, crippling poverty and inequality, and the failure of state institutions that have been eroded by corruption and neglect that's largely been blamed on Ramaphosa's own African National Congress party.

South Africa's May 29 election was a landmark for South Africa as voters frustrated with those three issues and others delivered the worst result ever for the ANC, which lost the majority it had held for 30 years since the end of the apartheid system of racial segregation and white minority rule.

“Despite the achievements of 30 years of democracy… millions of South Africans remain poor, unemployed and they live in a highly unequal society,” Ramaphosa said, conceding, as he's done previously, to some failures by the ANC.

“The circumstances of South Africa today require that we act together,” Ramaphosa added.

Ramaphosa's address began what South Africa calls “the seventh administration” — just the seventh government to be formed