The past 25 years engineered by the ANC have been a mess
Of course, society must be transformed. But what has happened over the past 25 years is a mess, engineered by the ANC alone.
The fact that only 6 million black people have entered the middle class and the vast majority are still poor and unemployed is testament to this. So the ANC keeps on blaming apartheid and colonialism. But apartheid and colonialism created the legacy, not the current dysfunctional system.
This current dysfunctional system sets black people up for failure.
Job descriptions were changed. Instead of 10 years, managers now require 5 years’ experience before being promoted into senior management positions.
Numerous unnecessary posts were created as organograms were expanded to accommodate friends and family, and incentivised by senior management pay which is based on the number of people working under them.
Add to this the accumulated above inflation increases over 25 years, and you have a situation where, for example, a public sector manager earns R1 million a year and his equivalent in the private sector only R500 000.
Another problem is the shortage of experienced black managers and engineers.
This leads to them working only one or two years in a post before being attracted by someone else offering more money, thus there’s not enough time to gain experience.
The shortage of black managers causes another problem – acting managers.
The public sector is choc a bloc full of acting managers, creating a dangerous situation. Imagine an unqualified and inexperienced acting manager in charge of an Eskom boiler. So far two boilers exploded, costing the consumer and taxpayer R4 billion in bailouts. New chief executive Andre de Ruyter is set up for failure the same way many black managers are set up for failure.
If you promote a student from Grade 8 to 12, that student will never pass Grade 12 no matter how many times he repeats it.
Is this system sustainable? No! There are numerous other problems with AA, quotas, BBBEE, cadre deployment, the Mining Charter, our educational system, etc. We have junk status waiting around the corner. After that it’s the IMF and its harsh austerity measures. NAUSHAD OMAR | Athlone