A government-owned corporation, state-owned company, state-owned entity, state enterprise, publicly owned corporation, government business enterprise, commercial government agency or parastatal is a legal entity created by a government to undertake commercial activities on behalf of an owner government. Their legal status varies from being a part of government into stock companies with a state as a regular stockholder. There is no standard definition of a government-owned corporation (GOC) or state-owned enterprise (SOE), although the two terms can be used interchangeably. The defining characteristics are that they have a distinct legal form and they are established to operate in commercial affairs. While they may also have public policy objectives, GOCs should be differentiated from other forms of government agencies or state entities established to pursue purely non-financial objectives.

GOCs can be fully owned or partially owned by Government. As a definitional issue, it is difficult to determine categorically what level of state ownership would qualify an entity to be considered as "state-owned", since governments can also own regular stock, without implying any special interference. As an example, the Chinese Investment Corporation agreed in 2007 to acquire a 10% interest in the global investment bank Morgan Stanley, but it is unlikely that this would qualify the latter as a government-owned corporation. Government-owned or state-run enterprises are often the result of corporatization, a process in which government agencies and departments are re-organized as semi-autonomous corporate entities, sometimes with partial shares listed on stock exchanges.

Knowledge Malusi Nkanyezi Gigaba (August 30, 1971 in Eshowe, KwaZulu-Natal) is the Minister of Public Enterprises in the government of South Africa. First elected to the National Assembly of South Africa in 1999 as part of the African National Congress, he resigned in 2001 but was re-elected in 2004. As Deputy Minister of Home Affairs has was very vocal against xenophobia, actively advocating for inclusion of all Africans. He was involved in a new visa system allowing easier legal flow of migration between South Africa and Zimbabwe. This and positive changes made in the department have won him praise from human rights organization PASSOP and from Adbell Musati, whose Zimbabwean twin brother starved outside of the South African home affairs offices.

Gigaba has also been active in youth organizations, and was elected president of the African National Congress Youth League three times in a row (1996, 1998, 2001).

He earned a bachelor's degree in education from the University of Durban-Westville (now part of the University of KwaZulu-Natal) in 1991, and a master's degree in social policy in 1994.