Private and public sector corruption hinders youth

CORRUPTION in the private and public sector can often hinder opportunities for young people to enter the jobs market.

These are some of the views contained in the government’s 2030 National Youth Policy released recently by the Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disability.

The document has recommended the introduction of a national basic income grant to help tackle the youth unemployment issue amid the country's youth unemployment rate sitting firmly at 55.75%.

Dominic Brown from the Budget Justice Coalition, a think tank that focuses on South Africa’s budget process, said there were many reasons why youth unemployment remained high. One was the structural and systematic barriers that often hindered opportunities for young people.

Brown was speaking at a webinar hosted by Corruption Watch, which focused on how corruption hinders opportunities for the youth.

Some of the structural problems identified are a lack of opportunities and decent jobs which could allow young people to enter the jobs market.

Corruption in the private and public sector, the webinar reported, often hindered opportunities for revenue collection to allow for better social spending, which in turn worsened inequality.

Brown pointed to billions of rand in procurement expenditure being deemed useless and wasteful expenditure, and to illicit financial flows in the private sector as another example of how corruption affected social spending.

He also criticised the government's approach to cutting social spending which has been labelled as “austerity”, adding this was often a short-term approach to dealing with issues.

Instead, he said, the government should be spending more to deal with structural issues, especially on issues that can help alleviate inequality.

On how to solve the unemployment problem, proposals include a basic income grant.

"A roll-out of a basic income grant could help the economy as people spend on goods and services. Consuming these goods would now create confidence and there will be greater demand and an increase in supply," Brown said.

Other measures to tackle inequality would include improvement in transport, health services and housing, Brown said, and none of these improvements would be possible in an “austerity” budget.

Nontsikelelo Makaula, a manager at the National Youth Development Agency (NYDA), said the organisation was working on improving the services offered to help young people. Makaula said the organisation was struggling to provide grants to all the organisations that approached it.

She added that NYDA was now available in major cities across the country as a response to the demand from young people.