The free press is awash with reports and stories chiselled out from surveys conducted by a variety of research houses. We receive tantalising information on economic empowerment, political support, labour trends, shopping preferences – you name it, there’
We can illustrate our concerns by taking a look at the recently released Commission for Employment Equity (CEE) report on transformation in the workplace. At first glance the report holds promise, because it covers 3 695 large employer firms and 4.4 million employees across South Africa. It’s streets ahead of the typical poll in terms of market penetration. The problem creeps in when you read different assessments of the survey results, when various organisations put their spin on the report data. How, for example, will this statistical data translate in the hands of the report’s commissioner (the CEE) on the one side – and the largely ‘white’ trade union Solidarity, on the other?
The report validates our continued existence
Mpho Nkeli, acting chairperson of the CEE says the report confirms the painfully slow rate of transformation in the South African workplace. She lamented the report findings, including the ongoing dominance by white males in the upper echelons of local corporations. In a Q&A published in the Finweek magazine, 12 August 2010, Nkeli was unrepentant. “Some 90% of this country is black,” she crowed, before questioning why white business should receive incentives to “find the right talent among [black] people.” In her view the report confirms that white dominance of the workplace is showing no signs of receding. “Companies are still promoting, recruiting, training and promoting white men more than anybody else,” she said.
When taken to task about skills shortages Nkeli took a similar line to CEE president and current DG for Labour, Jimmy Manyi. She doesn’t believe companies need engineers or CAs to fill their top executive structures… “Why is it ok for a white MD to have a BA degree, but require a CA or engineering degree from a black candidate?” Of course the CEE’s ‘reason for being’ is to transform the local workplace. They’re not going to be happy until their investigation shows an appropriate racial demographic in every single employee category. After reading the interview with Nkeli, this requirement is only met when 90% of all employed people – consistently through each occupation classification – are black.
The danger for corporate South Africa is moves are afoot to criminalise non compliance with Broad-based Black Economic Empowerment. “We’ve proposed fines [for non-transformed companies] be made tougher,” said Nkeli. “It must be easier for the department of labour to prosecute defaulting companies…”
A second take on the statistics
Solidarity is less impressed with the CEE report. In an article on online news portal Fin24.co.za, they said the report was littered with “flagrant errors and misconceptions” which rendered it useless as a policy guidance tool. In their view the report actually confirms a continued “reduction in the proportion of top-level jobs held by white people.” Their main objection to the report is the methodology used – namely self-selection by businesses. “This renders any conclusions with respect to changes in racial representation dubious,” said Solidarity. Aside from the worrying absence of correct statistical methodology the report includes some serious arithmetic errors.
Is there common ground?
At the end of the day it depends how you spin the data. Solidarity believes broadly “equitable racial representation” has been achieved in the lower levels – accounting for the vast majority of the country’s employed. The report showed overall white male representation in workplaces declined from 21.9% in 2001 to 15% in 2009. Black male representation increased from 28.3% in 2001 to 33.9% in 2003 and 39% in 2009. Unfortunately the report ignores the massive improvements in lower level representation, and focuses instead on the top occupations. It homes in on a fraction of the total survey, or 17 154 of the 4.4 million employees. The CEE is unhappy with the white saturation in these posts. They say 10 954 of the 17 154 top management posts are occupied by white males, with similar saturation among the senior manager category (37 755 out of 60 970) and professionally qualified individuals (139 949 out of 319 984).
Although we understand the requirement for transformation we question the sense of any policy that prevents companies from hiring appropriately qualified people on the basis of their race. How can a country with 25% “official” unemployment keep positions vacant because suitable black candidates aren’t available? How can anyone be happy with a policy forcing local companies to employ African Americans over local white candidates just to ensure their headcount is appropriately ‘coloured’. This race obsession is corrupting all levels of our society – even universities are window dressing – with a recent report confirming the majority of “black” post graduates are actually from other African countries. FAnews hopes the current obsession with racial quotas is abandoned to make way for a purer goal of ensuring every South African who wants gainful employment can find it!
Editor’s thoughts: It’s time we stopped tiptoeing around the employment equity and affirmative action debates. If South Africa wants to prosper it needs to find ways to employ all its citizens meaningfully. The goal should be to lift ‘black’ South Africans to the same levels of employment as ‘white’ South Africans – not to ensure 25% of ‘whites’ are unemployed too… How would you go about tackling employment equity issues? Add your comments below, or send them to gareth@fanews.co.za
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Added by Bidnis Man, 17 Aug 2010