Employment and labour minister Thulas Nxesi. File photo.The colonial apartheid past of injustices, including separate development and job reservation, continue to haunt South Africa in subtle ways. It’s still a long walk to total emancipation.
It is very clear in this 23rd CEE Annual Report that the labour market still remains hierarchical with whites occupying decision-making positions and black people ; women, in particular black women; and people with disabilities largely concentrated at the lower occupational levels of the workforce. This report reflects that, relative to the demographics of the economically active population as released quarterly by Statistics South Africa, marginal progress in relation to the equitable representation of the designated groups, in particular, Africans, coloureds, Indians and people with disabilities have been made in the middle-to-upper occupational levels of the workforce.
In terms of the overall representation of women, they only accounted for 26.5% and 37.2% of all positions at top and senior management levels respectively, as reported by all the designated employers at these two upper echelons of the workforce.