By Rachel Mohamed
Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) has recently released the latest unemployment figures on Tuesday, which show an uptick in joblessness. These figures paint a grim picture for the country’s youth showing that unemployment has increased to 33.5 percent during the second quarter, from 32.9 percent in the previous quarter.
Speaking on VOC’s Breakfast show on Thursday, the Portfolio Head of Youth Employment at Momentum Group Nkosinathi Mahlangu said that the figures have significantly increased at an alarming rate “when looking at the expanded statistics of youth unemployment which is currently sitting at over 60 percent,” he commented.
He further blamed the weak performance of SA’s economy as a contributing factor that has worsened over the years. The rise in the unemployment rate especially affects the younger population. He stated that many young people have now given up hope of finding work.
“During pre-election times the parties’ manifestos have promised to say they plan to curb unemployment. And now with the GNU space, the executive needed to look at how to implement those plans and promises to try and create a viable economic state.”
“However, on the other hand, we had sectors such as agriculture, manufacturing, and the services sector that have been carrying the economy in terms of creating jobs, and those jobs could have been contractual or short-term jobs, but we need to tap into other sectors and not only look at the limited sectors being the catalyst on how do we fast track unemployment.”
Mahlangu further highlighted the high levels of unemployment as the statistics have shown that black women are living in dire situations in the country.
“It is difficult for households in SA where they cannot make ends meet and many of those households live way below the bread line. Looking at the demographics of South Africa 51% of our population are females and stats show that 50% of black African females are living in the most vulnerable of conditions.”
Mahlangu believes that the public and private sectors need to work together to ensure that workplace experience is part and parcel of SA’s education, especially when getting the fundamentals right from the education system because workplace experience is important.
“There are entry-level jobs where workplace experience can be trained on the job, however, we need interventions that prepare young people for the job market.”
“How do we make sure work experience is part and parcel of that system whether you are a student at TVET colleges or universities and while you are still at high school?” questioned Mahlangu.
According to Mahlangu exposing students to work-life expectations is imperative in preparing youth.
“How do we bring the world of work expectations to high school so they can do vocational work and be exposed to the work environment so that we can transition students from the education space into the world of work?”
Mahlangu felt strongly about the education department reviewing its curriculum to create opportunities for learners at the high school level.
“To obtain a driver’s license once they get their matric certificate they can enter the e-hailing sectors as we need to put our processes in place to work by getting stakeholders to pull in the same direction.”
“We are very optimistic as South Africans but also need to be realistic as we have been advocating from the Momentum Group foundation that collaboration is the way to go. Looking at where we are as the Government of National Unity, for the government to create an enabling environment ready for dialogue of this nature we need to include the voices of the youth,” he concluded.
VOC News
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