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On Tuesday, the Cape Forum and Solidarity, together with community leaders, petitioned Parliament in Cape Town about the impact of the Employment Equity Amendment Act of 2022 and recently published draft regulations under the new Act.
Among other things, these groups requested a special parliamentary debate on the matter and for Parliament to intervene and stop the new ‘race law’. According to the petition, the new law and the regulations are unconstitutional and irrational. “The regulations require that positions for coloured employees be reduced by 25% and that positions for white and Indian employees be reduced by 66%. These regulations want to deprive people of their livelihood, and to do so on the basis of skin colour. To think that any person or business will readily accept this is absurd,” Heindrich Wyngaard, chairperson of the Cape Forum, contended. The action taken by the Cape Forum and Solidarity stems from a resolution which, together with around 30 other organisations, they signed on 6 June and in which they undertook to resist the regulations. The two organisations are also of the opinion that by not giving sufficient time for input on the regulations, the government is deliberately suppressing the voices of thousands of employees and employers. Solidarity Chief Executive Dr Dirk Hermann said: “Through this petition we want to see that a debate is opened on this law, and we want to participate in that debate. It is time for the government to realise that it has a responsibility towards the entire South Africa and not just towards its cadres or potential voters. Solidarity, the Cape Forum and other community leaders stand together to remind the government of this very responsibility and to call them to account. Such racial discrimination will not be tolerated.”
- Read Solidarity’s press statement on this matter and download the petition at Solidarity News
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