DA legal challenge to Employment Equity sparks political divide

Against the background of the DA challenging the Employment Equity (EE) Act, aimed at forcing companies to comply with the latest legislative changes, geared at redressing apartheid imbalances at workplace, the EE debate has fuelled political polarisation in the country’s labour movement.

The DA has argued that new employment quotas would “cut hundreds of thousands of South Africans out of employment – unfair and unconstitutional” – a stance supported by the National Employers’ Association of South Africa (Neasa), Solidarity and other unions on the right.

This as President Cyril Ramaphosa and the country’s largest labour federations Cosatu and Saftu, have seen EE as “necessary and significant in redressing the past”.

Employment Equity a ‘necessary and significant in redressing the past’

Writing in his weekly newsletter, Ramaphosa said South Africa’s labour laws were “part of our effort to overcome the structural inequality of apartheid”.

He said the latest report of the EE commission, showed “how far we still have to go in ending the race-based disparities that exist in our economy”.

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“Despite Africans constituting the majority of the economically active population, the majority of top management positions in the private sector are still held by white males.”

Cosatu national spokesperson Matthew Parks said targets are “a necessity, given how many sectors and employers in the private sector have chosen to ignore the call to embrace a nonracial society.

“There has been minimal progress in the banking, insurance, mining and retail sectors,” he said.

Minimal progress in banking, insurance, mining and retail

“The DA case was lodged in 2023 as they were preparing to campaign for the 2024 elections.

“It’s a tragedy that they sought to exploit and fuel fears of white, coloured and Indian workers – claiming their jobs were at risk.”

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Saftu national spokesperson Newton Masuku said the EE Act was “significant to address discriminatory practices of the past”.

“The recent amendment to the Act was due to most companies not complying – setting targets and not meeting them.”

Masuku said EE was “not a racial law” – an argument dismissed by Neasa.

Neasa disagrees that EE ‘not a racial law’

“Since the dawn of the Employment Equity Act in 1998, the law has succeeded – not in achieving its stated aims – but rather in creating a marginal group of elites,” said Neasa spokesperson Chanté Dean.

Dean added that this system of “pseudo empowerment and veneer-thin transformation” is seeking to extend its tentacles even further.

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“What is truly cumbersome, is government’s absolute ignorance to the effects of their destructive and business-debilitating policies and laws,” she added.