The following is an extract of a speech delivered by Grantham Steenkamp Rhoda MPL during the Freedom Day debates convened in the Northern Cape Provincial Legislature today.
Since 1994, Workers’ Day has celebrated the role played by trade and labour unions against racial discrimination and towards fair employment standards.
Unfortunately, government’s failure to respond to the challenges faced by the unemployed has largely spoiled the significance of Worker’s Day in South Africa and this day has instead come to symbolize not only the scores of South Africans who are out of work and the many discouraged jobseekers who have given up finding work altogether, but also violations of worker’s rights committed and tolerated by the government itself.
Hon. Speaker, the Northern Cape is the province with the biggest difference between the official unemployment rate and the expanded unemployment rate which takes the discouraged jobseekers into consideration. This difference stands at a massive 21,9% and exposes the extremely high levels of hopelessness amongst our people who do not think jobs are available in the Northern Cape or who do not think that they will find a job with their skills or qualifications.
I regret to say that many of these discouraged jobseekers are unfortunately correct.
This is a country where graduates sit at home. Reports indicate that in the second half of 2022, there were 742 000 unemployed tertiary educated graduates in South Africa. Worryingly, graduate employment is still said to be growing at an alarming rate.
Hon. Speaker, this comes as no surprise. Even qualified doctors and nurses fail to secure jobs in the Northern Cape, despite the high vacancy rates in our health facilities, not to mention the global health emergency declared by the World Health Organisation in respect of the worldwide shortage of nurses.
Disturbingly, we see vacancies in just about every government sector imaginable.
The Northern Cape seriously lacks Emergency Medical Services employees, which perpetuates the hazardous single crew ambulances. The province also only has a fraction of the number of traffic officers required to effectively police our provincial and municipal roads, aggravating road fatalities. The list goes on and on.
In fact, in reply to a parliamentary question, the Minister of Public Service and Administration recently indicated that, as at 31 December 2022, the Northern Cape had 5 186 vacant funded posts.
Don’t get me wrong. I am not saying that the state is responsible for creating work. The state should be creating an environment that is conducive to economic growth and job creation. What is noteworthy, however, is that South Africa is facing such a massive jobs crisis that even the ANC-government can barely afford to employ professionals in essential services, or reward cadres with positions.
This should not be blamed on the global economic climate.
The South African government’s financial crisis is rooted in the ANC government’s longstanding focus towards self-enrichment, mismanagement and the diversion of money away from service delivery and infrastructure into the pockets of the corrupt.
Even the ruling party has not come away unscathed. In respect of labour law, the ANC last year failed to pay staff members their salaries for months. Not paying the agreed wage on the agreed date and at the agreed time, can be considered the ultimate mistreatment of workers.
Disturbingly, this behaviour is further seen in the Northern Cape at a local government level as well.
Workers have gone without salaries, or received late salaries in municipalities like Renosterberg, Thembelihle and Magareng. As a result, municipal employees lost their medical aid coverage and more, due to a lack of good financial management. This is a gross violation of worker’s rights by local government.
Last year, we saw the former municipal manager of Kai !Garib arrested because of the role he played in causing employee’s pension funds to lapse due to the municipality failing to pay over pension fund contributions. This was another serious contravention of worker’s rights. Yet, the responsible municipal manager enjoys a promotion as the head of a provincial government department. What does this say about the ANC’s level of genuine concern for its own employees?
Hon. Speaker, earlier this year the DA highlighted a situation at the Abraham Esau hospital whereby nine cleaners, some of whom worked there for between ten and eighteen years through positions with Non-Government Organisations or through temporary contracts with the department, were overlooked for permanent positions following a decision to insource the cleaning function. There was strong reason to believe that this was due to their political affiliation and their lack of ties to connected individuals.
Whatever happened to the right to fair labour practices? Was this more of the debilitating practice of cadre deployment and of rewarding loyalists at the expense of genuine workers who are better suited to the positions?
Which is why it worries me that provincial departments can never provide answers to the DA’s questions relating to job equity. The greatest imbalance of opportunities are the criteria used by the connected elite to appoint who they deem qualified – irrespective of fairness, opportunity and diversity – core beliefs that only the DA stands firm in believing.
Has the Z83 job application form become another useless document to show that due process was followed? Is it another box to tick off? Because what can be seen from the outside completely goes against the “old” ANC’s liberation movement.
South Africa’s progressive labour laws, aligned with the Bill of Rights and the Constitution, are there to protect workers from such exploitation and unfair treatment. Government should be the frontrunner in this and not form part of the exploitation and unfair treatment.
At the same time, government should be working harder to get the people of the province working, not putting people out of work with a stagnant economy, job-killing loadshedding or draconian race-based policies like the Employment Equity Amendment Act.
The provisions of this Act will result in a further exodus of skills from South Africa and introduce large amounts of unnecessary red tape for employers wishing to do business with the state. This will lead to even further stagnation of the South African economy, and a lack of economic opportunity for those who need it most.
In closing, I therefore call on this House to remember that, for the sake of workers everywhere, there are immediate solutions to get more people into employment.
Amongst others, these interventions include:
• Making it easier to do business;
• Ending raced-based legislation, which primarily serves the elite and has been identified as a deterrent to investment;
• Ensuring affordable, sustainable, and reliable electricity; and
• Paying small businesses on time to ensure their survival.
Without jobs, workers cannot work. At the same time, every worker should be able to access, and stand a fair chance at ample job opportunities and enjoy fair labour practices, and their hard-earned monthly salaries, in order to live a dignified life.
Thank you.