No more jobs for votes

Duma Gqubule is being disingenuous (“The public sector needs to employ more people, not fewer”, January 16). The critical issue is not the number of public sector workers in SA, but their level of productivity and hugely inflated wages.

Half of public servants will earn between the annual ranges of R350,001 and R600,000 in 2023/24. The number of government employees earning more than R1m per year has increased from 10,000 to 55,000 in the past 10 years.

The median public sector salary is R46,000 per month, while the private sector’s is R26,000. The public sector wage bill is the single largest component of government expenditure at 30%.

As a share of GDP, it is 3.5% greater than the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average. This decreases spending on capital projects for future growth as well as items crucial for service delivery, and means 30% of government expenditure goes to just 2% of the population.

Banging on about vacant positions is simply a red herring not to hold the ANC regime accountable for its corrupt patronage network, which has destroyed so many sectors of SA society.

Vacant positions could be filled far quicker if nonsensical employment equity and foreign worker regulations are relaxed. It is time to grow up and admit that SA is a struggling developing country with severe fiscal constraints and huge skills shortages.

Every respected analyst (including international bodies such as the World Bank) has warned that SA’s debt levels are unsustainable. It is simply not logical to offer the full bouquet of public services (National Health Insurance anyone?) that are available in developed countries when you can’t even get the basics right. For example, why is there not a word in Gqubule’s piece about privatising critical infrastructure such as railways?

The public sector needs to be professionalised before any major expansion takes place. That means dismantling the ANC’s corrupt “jobs for votes” patronage network and employing suitably qualified/experienced people. As for the underspending of budgets, it has been proved countless times that this happens due to unqualified cadres being parachuted into senior planning roles.

Marc Lyon

Via BusinessLIVE