Shift in focus needed

SOUTH AFRICA faces a profound set of social and economic challenges. What should we be doing to improve housing affordability?

How can we reduce the widening gap between the country’s richest and poorest areas? What’s the solution to deepening jobs insecurity in the lowpaid labour market?

How do we tackle relatively innumeracy among our young people? Why has wage growth come to a grinding halt?

How can we ensure we provide sufficient quality care for our rapidly ageing population?

The good news is that this is a set of questions with answers. The bad news: the solutions are neither simple nor easy. They should be absorbing the minds of politicians and policymakers; not tottering around the world for photo shots.

There is a dangerous gulf opening up between what will command their attention in the coming years and what the country really needs.

South Africa requires a government focused on these big challenges. Instead, we have a government distracted by the fiendishly Gupta saga.

The government should rather concentrate to deliver on promises made to the landless and the unemployed.

This is a sharp reminder of structural problems in our economy that have long gone unaddressed. We have the highest level of inequality in Africa between whites and the black Africans, which only got worse since the advent of democracy. Some parts of the country are facing a decline in local industry, far too few good schools, and a lack of jobs and opportunities for young people.

Improving the quality of jobs and economic opportunities across the country should be an urgent priority, yet significant risks to the labour market are looming.

Too many jobs are low quality, offering low pay, little autonomy and few opportunities for progression. Work is also becoming increasingly precarious for the majority of workers.

These are stubborn challenges, but they are fixable. Doing so, however, requires investment, energy and longterm reform.

Instead, we have a government not only consumed by maladministration and corruption, but intent on further entrenching economic and social inequalities.

Thanking you. Sol Asmal Cape Town