Partnerships put young people on first rung of the jobs ladder
One of premier David Makhura’s priorities is to address youth unemployment in Gauteng through the Tshepo 1 Million programme.
Through the Tshepo 1 Million and other programmes, the provincial government hopes to address youth unemployment and empowerment. The programme is aimed at empowering one million young people in the province through skills training, job placement and entrepreneurship development, which in turn helps the youth to find sustainable jobs.
The initiative was launched in 2014 under the name Tshepo 500 000.
After its resounding success, it was rebranded and unveiled as Tshepo 1 Million in January 2017, after it created over 350 000 opportunities in less than two years.
Makhura believes youth unemployment can be addressed with the co-operation of the private sector. At the moment, the provincial government has entered into a partnership with several companies to uplift and empower young people who have lost hope of finding a job or starting a business. These companies include Microsoft, Gijima Technologies, Black Umbrellas, Broll, Coca Cola, Absa and Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator.
“As I have said before, youth unemployment is the most acute and primary economic problem of our time. Economics shall fall if it fails to answer the question of how we resolve youth unemployment. Politics will have no future relevance if youth are left out,” said Makhura during his state of the province address.
“In Gauteng, there are close to two million young people who are neither in employment, in education nor in training. Some of them are on the verge of losing hope, while others have drifted to crime and other social ills such as drug and substance abuse.”
Makhura said it was for this reason that his administration had launched this largescale and massive programme, Tshepo 1 Million, as an intervention to open opportunities with regard to demand-led skills development, job placement and entrepreneurship for the youth of Gauteng.
“This ground-breaking partnership between the Gauteng provincial government, Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator and more than 40 major private sector corporations is a living example of a social compact,” said Makhura.
Emmanuel Mdhluli, Black Umbrellas’ chief operating officer, said the partnership with the Gauteng provincial government in the form of Tshepo 1 Million was one of the most innovative and ground-breaking ways to create sustainable jobs and to support those who would like to become entrepreneurs, particularly unemployed youth in the townships of Soweto, Tshwane, Vaal and Ekurhuleni.
“Tshepo 1 Million is a fantastic partnership with the Gauteng government and the office of the premier Makhura,” said Mdhluli.
“We are determined to empower young people in Gauteng with skills development so they can become employable and start their own businesses by offering them business development support and an opportunity to formalise their own enterprises in the townships.”
Beatrice Mudau, 22, comes from Mukobhawabale in Limpopo and now she lives in Johannesburg.
After matric, her family could not support her desire to study at a university and so she had to look for work.
After going through four-month-long training at the Harambee Youth Employment Accelerator through Tshepo 1 Million, she landed her first internship as a human resources intern at the Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital.
Her life has changed dramatically since she started working.
“I am like sunshine and each day I experience marvellous things. I am able to do things on my own and help other people. My life is full of joy! To my fellow youth out there, it’s just a matter of time, you have to be patient. Be a person of your word. If you want to do something, do it, stay focused and don’t give up on your dreams until you win,” she said in an interview.
Erasmus Matsalani, 26, is currently working as a financial adviser at Momentum after going through various assessments and a bridging programme through Tshepo 1 Million.
After completing matric, Matsalani looked for a job for a year without success and then decided to better his life and chances by studying through a bursary from the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS). He is in his final year of studies but needed a job to pay for his studies as NSFAS could not fund him further.
His greatest achievement to date is that he is staying in his own apartment, living independently and able to send money home to his parents.
“I am proud to have gone through Tshepo 1 Million. It has opened my eyes to the bigger world out there,” said Matsalani.
Sinethemba Nonkala, 26, who is from Tembisa, Ekurhuleni, is employed as a cashier at Woolworths.
Due to lack of financial support, he dropped out of college and started searching for a job. He was later signed up for Tshepo 1 Million after a friend had recommended it to him.
“They did not promise me a job but an opportunity as a stepping stone to employment. From the time I registered, it took about three months before I got an opportunity. During my training I learnt how to respect other people’s culture and how to interact with people. I am currently working as a cashier at Woolworths,” said Nonkala.
An impact assessment study by the Gauteng Enterprise Propeller found that most governments needed to improve advertising campaigns in order for more young people to be aware of the service offered by government agencies such as GEP.
GEP supports the 11 sectors under the Gauteng provincial government’s transformation, modernisation and re-industrialisation initiative. These include agro-processing, automotive, manufacturing, information communications technology, tourism, pharmaceutical, creative industries, construction, real estate, finance and mineral beneficiation.
It was recommended that the GEP should try to extend its loan amounts offered because, many of the applicants required higher loan amounts.
The study also found that many young people were not familiar with business ethics, techniques and management skills. It said it would be advantageous if GEP could provide mentorship as part of the business development support packages to assist their clients by teaching them business skills to be successful.
Among others, the impact assessment study highly recommended that regional offices of the GEP be used more as one-stop offices where IT-related facilities like internet, printing, fax and e-mail could be offered to SMMEs and co-operatives. Each regional and satellite office should have a computer centre for SMMEs and co-operatives.
“GEP should consider introducing an accounting service to SMMEs and co-operatives,” according to the impact assessment study.
“This will assist with formalising SMMEs and co-operatives business practices. The accounting service will also reduce the turnaround time for SMMEs and co-operatives accordingly. The accounting service will also reduce the turnaround time for SMMEs and co-operatives to submit financial applications.”
“Since 2015, nearly 460 000 young people have benefited from the Tshepo 500 000 flagship programme. This programme has now been upgraded and rebooted into Tshepo 1 Million so that we can change the lives of many more young people in our province and give them hope,” said Makhura.
“The call made by President [Cyril] Ramaphosa to place the unemployed youth in paid internships in companies across the economy, will inject momentum to the work we are already doing on Tshepo 1 Million. We can get more companies to lend a hand and give our youth a chance.”
Makhura is also investing in the future by supporting highly promising science students through the Sci-Bono Discovery Centre in Johannesburg. The students are learning how to build ground-breaking apps, robotics and artificial intelligence.
The Sci-Bono Discovery Centre, Southern Africa’s largest science centre, is affiliated to the Gauteng department of education to support maths, science and technology education and to help build South Africa’s science, engineering and technology capacity. SciBono is responsible for implementing the Gauteng mathematics, science and technology education strategy.
Last month, Makhura graced the Sci-Bone Discovery Centre to congratulate the SciBono clubhouse robotics team who were awarded the premier’s special award in the fourth industrial revolution category.