Monday, October 27, 2008

Affirmative action must stay - Zuma

Cape Argus
October 27, 2008
Edition 1

It was still too early to end affirmative action, ANC president Jacob Zuma said at the weekend. In a speech prepared for delivery at an investors' lunch in New York, he also said the ANC was confident of a decisive victory in next year's general election. Zuma, who earlier this week met top US officials in Washington, said black people and women were still largely excluded from upper and middle management. The Employment Equity Commission had noted in 2007 that whites continued to dominate senior management at 65%, with blacks at 18%, and that the bulk of new recruits were white as well. "The employment equity figures clearly indicate that it is still early days to call for an end of affirmative action in South Africa," Zuma said. President Kgalema Motlanthe, then still a minister in the presidency, said in August that the government would consider phasing out the programme, but only after careful consideration. In the same month, ANC treasurer-general Mathews Phosa lamented the fact that the departure of whites from the public service had left a skills vacuum in certain areas.
http://www.capeargus.co.za/index.php?fSectionId=3571&fArticleId=4682518&ap=1#

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