The South African rand dropped sharply on Wednesday as a fractious budget vote threw into doubt the solidity of the coalition government.

The South African rand weakened early on Tuesday as negotiations between coalition partners over the deadlocked budget dragged on, hours before a key parliamentary committee was set to debate it. Local news reports had said on Monday that the two biggest political parties in the coalition,

The second largest party in South Africa’s coalition, the business-friendly Democratic Alliance, launched a legal challenge on Thursday to block a 0.5% VAT increase in the country’s new budget, raising concerns that the fragile government could collapse.