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The Congress of South African Trade Unions has noted the latest quarterly employment statistics that show a 1, 4% increase in the unemployment rate. According to the Quarterly Labour Force Survey for the second quarter, the unemployment rate has gone from 27, 6% to 29%.

There is nothing shocking about these statistics because it seems the government has no other policy but to destroy jobs and send people onto the unemployment line. The public service is retrenching through the back door by retiring workers prematurely and the SOEs are preparing to retrench en masse.

This has sent a message to the private sector that it’s open season on workers. Government’s policy of increasing unemployment through massive retrenchment is actually delivering results.

Presidential Jobs and Investment Summits with progressive commitments were held, yet we have seen very little by either government or business to honour those agreements.Whilst we have seen positive reports from the Reserve Bank about R71 billion worth of investments flowing into the economy, a five-year record, this has clearly not been able to stem the flood of retrenchments.

The latest statistics bear reflect the jobs bloodbath that we have seen in the mining and banking sectors. We have seen no plan from the government to save the mining industry which is hell-bent on replacing workers with machines or simply just retrenching because of the crisis of profits.

Eskom and the other key SOEs like SABC, PRASA, SAA and Denel are on the verge of collapse, while there is no clear plan from the government to save them beyond borrowing money each month.  Eskom will collapse not only the state but the entire economy if it is not saved but unfortunately the nation has not been informed by the government on what is the plan to save Eskom.

This is happening at a time when South Africa is already the country with the highest youth unemployment rate in the world. This is a pure recipe for social upheaval and we expect President Cyril Ramaphosa’s addiction to the neoliberal policies based on “market forces” and international competitiveness to worsen the situation. No country has ever solved its economic problems by outsourcing them to profiteers and speculators.  
There is no government plan to solve the situation if the State of the Nation is to be believed. A promise of two million jobs over ten years when you have the highest unemployment rate in the world is an admission of defeat.

The National Treasury and SARB’s superstitious fixation with narrow bands of inflation-targeting and budget-deficit and at the expense of industrial expansion and job creation are a reminder that the centrality of jobs creation is more of a slogan than a policy for government.
The government’s policy of cutting social expenditure and weakening the capacity of the state means that millions of South Africans are facing lives of brute survival and hopelessness. This recycling of failed policies will only lead to social upheaval and a complete collapse of the state.
The Federation will discuss this situation in the upcoming Central Executive Committee meeting next month and has already planned a series of bilateral meetings with other trade union formations to plot the way forward for the workers.  

Issued by COSATU