DA POLICY OF EMPLOYMENT - ''WIT FOR PURPOSE''

The recent Commission on Employment Equity report has once again exposed the Democratic Alliance run Western Cape government as being the least representative and least transformed government in respect of race and gender in the country. Sadly, but not surprisingly, the Premier of the Province Helen Zille, has blatantly refused to explain the lack of progress in this regard. She refuses to explain to the people of this province why the DA government has not been able to ensure that it's management is representative of the demographics of province and the country.

Instead she has blamed it on the historically exploited and oppressed Black, Coloured and women people themselves, stating they are not qualified and not experienced enough. Transforming the demographics of government and the private sector to ensure that it is representative of the people is a constitutional and legislative imperative designed to deliberately address one of the blatant legacies of colonialism and apartheid i.e. to correct the historical imbalances in employment in respect of race, gender and disability.

Instead, since the public expose of the DA's reactionary employment practices, it has once again reverted to the politics of deflection, deception and deceit by attempting to discredit the report of an independent institution before it was even published, rather than honestly engage with the facts. All the spin that the DA has contrived is once again evidence that the policies of the DA are there only to protect and perpetuate white privilege. Let us cut through all the spin that the DA has deployed and as a point of departure let us interrogate the recruitment practices of heads of departments  (HOD's) since the DA government took over in 2009.

Currently of the 13 departments in the Provincial Government there are 7 white HODs (of which 2 are female) and one acting white male HOD, whose experience and qualifications are themselves questionable.  Whites constitute 62% of all heads of departments. There are currently 4 Coloured  HODs ( of which 1 is female ) and 1 African male head of department, who has apparently just resigned and was hesitantly-by the Premier-matched and placed into the post since he was already on the level of a DDG after the DAs restructuring. His appointment was therefor not a promotion

Coloured HODs only constitute 30,7 % of the top echelons of the DA administration and Africans constitute a measly 7,6 %. Equally worrying is that Women-including White women-only constitute 23% of the HODs.

This is a far cry from where we should be when comparing it to the demographics of the province where economically active population are Coloureds 52,5% and Africans 31,6%, Whites 15,6%, Indians 0,3% women 46,8%.

When the ANC left power in 2009 there were 12 Departments as opposed to the current 13 since the Department of Housing and Local Government was a single department. At this time the demographic make up was much different. There were 6 Coloured HODs, of which 3 were female and 1 disabled, including a female Director General in the Department of the Premier. There were 2 African heads of Department, of which 1 was female and 2 White male heads of department.

Coloured HOD's constituted 50%, Africans constituted 16,6%, Whites 16,6% and there was a 16,6% vacancy rate. Women constituted 25% and disabled 8,3 %. While the situation in 2009 was not perfect, there was a definite trend towards the progressive realization of ensuring that the top management of the province was becoming more representative of the demographics of the province and reversing the discrimination that was left behind by the DA when it was in power in 1999.

This was the situation when the DA took over in 2009. However, rather than building on the progressive foundation that the ANC government had set, since then we have sadly seen a backward slide in the situation, back to the bad old days of the pre-1994 apartheid era and 1999-2001 when the DA was in power. Since 2009 there has been a sharp increase in the number of white HODs from 16,6% to 62%. There has been a drastic decline in the number of Coloured and African HODs from 50% to 30,7% and 16,6 % to 7,6% respectively. There has also been a decline in the number of female HODs from 25% to 23% and no disabled HODs.

While one could reasonably argue that changing the demographic make up of management is a difficult and sensitive process and one is only able to increase the racial and gender transformation when posts become vacant, the DA cannot use this as an excuse as the filling of vacancies of HODs since it has been in power tells a completely different story. It is one of the DA rolling back transformation-in terms of appointments of staff and in the economy of giving business to Black entrepreneurs and of worsening service delivery to the mainly Black and Coloured poor.

Helen Zille claims that she has difficulty in recruiting sufficiently qualified and experienced Coloured, African and female Heads of Departments. This argument is untrue and insulting to these previously disadvantaged groups of people. If the ANC was able to find sufficiently experienced and suitably qualified managers when it controlled the Provincial Government, why is the DA having difficulty? If Helen Zille was serious about transformation, why did she purge the provincial government of some of its best and brightest African, Coloured and female HODs?

The reality is that it is an excuse to perpetuate, protect and provide employment to her White, privileged and male dominated DA members and supporters. This is just apartheid discrimination by another name, where the best jobs are reserved for Whites and White males in particular.

Sadly this archaic apartheid era trend permeates her cabinet, legislature, party structures and all areas of the top, executive senior and middle management within the provincial government, the local governments (that it controls) as well as the provincial state owned entities such as Wesgro, and its tourism entity. This reality also shows why the DA and its supporters are supporting the Solidarity legal attack on employment equity in the Department of Correctional Services. It is not surprising that most Africans and Coloureds living in this province perceive the DA's recruitment policy which it calls ''fit for purpose'', as being in reality, "wit for purpose".

Phillip Dexter is the ANC Communications Coordinator in the Western Cape, a former trade unionist and a former MP.

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