Yes4Youth relents to pressure by Solidarity – white youth now also included
11 March 2019
Solidarity Youth today said that it had received a letter from Yes4Youth’s legal team confirming that the Yes4Youth job creation scheme would now be accessible to all young South Africans, regardless of race. Previously, the scheme did not give access to young white South Africans to use this platform to apply for jobs.
This drastic about-turn comes after the continued pressure Solidarity Youth brought to bear on the scheme since October 2018 to also allow young white South Africans to make use of the platform to apply for jobs.
According to Solidarity Youth coordinator Paul Maritz, this is a significant victory for the white South African youth. “We are pleased by Yes4Youth’s decision to open the doors of their programme to all young South Africans. We see it as a concession that an obsession with race has no place in South Africa, and that poverty and suffering are not limited to certain groups only. Today we celebrate equal opportunities for all young South Africans,” Maritz said.
Towards the end of 2018 Solidarity Youth became aware of the programme’s exclusionary nature and approached Yes4Youth on behalf of one of its members. According to Maritz, young people who wanted to use the platform had to click “yes” or “no” below the question: “I am Black, Colored, or Indian”. The answer then determined whether or not the candidate could continue with his or her application on the Yes4Youth platform. Maritz also says that this question has in the meantime been removed from the website, and that applicants now only have to answer questions about their nationality and age.
“Yes4Youth’s decision to include all young South Africans on the platform gives us hope. It is a step in the right direction to make exclusion on the grounds of race a thing of the past in South Africa.
Solidarity Youth pursues equal opportunities for all young South Africans. “We hope Yes4Youth’s decision will be an example to companies such as Discovery, Eskom and Sasol so that they would soon cease their practices of exclusion based on race,” Maritz said.
Issued by Francois Redelinghuys, Spokesperson, Solidarity, 11 March 2019
