Gwede Mantashe’s shocking statements on unemployed South Africans reflect a man deeply out of touch with the realities faced by ordinary people.
According to Mantashe, the ANC has given people a fishing rod and cannot do the fishing for them. But the truth is that there are no fish in the lake to be caught.
Unemployed South Africans are not lazy and are not basking in the sun waiting for a job. They are confronted daily by constant and systemic barriers to success.
The idea that there are millions of jobs just waiting to be filled has no grounding in fact.
The biggest problem facing unemployed South Africans is the ANC’s anti-growth agenda. Entrepreneurs and small businesses that want to expand and create jobs are suffocated by excessive regulation, a burden that will only be worsened by the Minister of Small Business Development’s Business Licensing Bill. Meanwhile, investors with the capacity to create thousands of jobs are pressured into surrendering ownership stakes and billions of rands to a politically connected elite, or they walk away entirely, taking those potential jobs with them.
Beyond this, the DA has put forward constructive, growth-focused solutions at a national level. The DA’s Economic Inclusion for All Bill places practical proposals on the table to lower barriers to entry, expand access to opportunity, and make it easier for businesses to create jobs. Unlike the ANC’s rhetoric, this legislation is focused on removing obstacles to work and growth, not blaming unemployed South Africans for an economy that past governments have broken.
Where the DA governs, we do things differently. The Western Cape continues to lead the country in job creation. Minister Macpherson’s promise to turn South Africa into a building site is being kept: construction created 130 000 new jobs last quarter, and confidence in the sector is at decade-long highs. The City of Cape Town’s Jobs Connect platform links young Capetonians directly with employment opportunities.
Where the DA is in power, we make it easier for unemployed South Africans to find work and for the entrepreneurs who create jobs to hire them. We do not erect barriers to success and then accuse people of laziness for failing to overcome them.