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The South African Federation of Trade Unions (SAFTU) expressed “deep alarm” over Statistics South Africa’s latest Quarterly Employment Statistics (QES) for the second quarter of 2025, which revealed a continued deterioration in employment levels across key sectors.<\/span><\/p>\n The QES report showed a troubling decline of 80,000 jobs from March to June 2025, bringing total employment figures down from 10.59 million to just over 10.5 million workers. <\/span><\/p>\n The job losses were most severe in community services, with 53,000 fewer jobs, followed by trade (10,000), manufacturing (9,000), construction (7,000), transport (2,000), and business services (2,000). <\/span><\/p>\n Although the mining and electricity sectors recorded slight gains of 2,000 and 1,000 jobs, respectively, these increases pale compared to the 229,000 jobs lost year-on-year between June 2024 and June 2025.<\/span><\/p>\n Full-time employment decreased by 55,000 jobs quarter-on-quarter, while part-time employment declined by 36,000. <\/span><\/p>\n There are now more than 8.4 million unemployed South Africans, with nearly half of the working-age population excluded from meaningful employment.<\/span><\/p>\n In a statement released on Wednesday, SAFTU General Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi criticised South Africa\u2019s ongoing structural jobs crisis. <\/span><\/p>\n “These grim figures confirm once again that South Africa remains trapped in a structural jobs crisis, a crisis born of neoliberal austerity, deindustrialisation, and elite enrichment at the expense of the working class.” <\/span><\/p>\n The union pointed to more profound economic failings behind the statistics, blaming decades of neoliberal policies favouring market liberalisation and foreign investment over job creation and industrial development. <\/span><\/p>\n \u201cSince the adoption of GEAR in 1996, the promise that market liberalisation and foreign direct investment would create jobs has proven to be a cruel lie,\u201d the statement reads.<\/span><\/p>\n SAFTU highlighted economic indicators showing that the Private sector fixed investment contributes only 10.8% of GDP, while the Public sector investment contributes just 4.3%.<\/span><\/p>\n It stated that Combined Gross Fixed Capital Formation remains stuck at 15% of GDP \u2014 half of the 30% needed to stimulate inclusive growth. GDP growth was a sluggish 0.8% in Q1 2025, narrowly avoiding a recession. Manufacturing capacity utilisation stagnates at 77\u201379%, meaning nearly a quarter of productive capacity remains idle.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThis is not a problem of lazy workers but of disinvestment, load-shedding, collapsing rail and ports, cheap imports, and the absence of any coherent re-industrialisation strategy,\u201d said National Spokesperson Newton Masuku.<\/span><\/p>\n SAFTU warned of the growing social consequences of this failed economic model, including mass unemployment and poverty, extreme inequality, collapsing public services, rising crime and gender-based violence, and widespread youth hopelessness. <\/span><\/p>\n The union described the current Government of National Unity\u2019s response as entrenched in the neoliberal policies that have failed South Africans for nearly thirty years.<\/span><\/p>\n The union singled out initiatives like Operation Vulindlela and ongoing austerity measures as deepening the crisis rather than resolving it, calling instead for a fundamental shift towards “redistribution, social ownership, and democratic control of the economy.”<\/span><\/p>\n SAFTU\u2019s demands include ending austerity and neoliberal policies that “strangle growth and jobs” and launching a mass public investment programme to rebuild infrastructure and public services and re-industrialise the economy.<\/span><\/p>\n In addition, suggested the Implementing of a democratic public works programme guarantees jobs with decent wages and conditions, and leverages idle manufacturing capacity with an industrial strategy focused on localisation, beneficiation, and import substitution.<\/span><\/p>\n SAFTU demanded urgent steps to halt the investment strike from private capital and state segments and build a new economic model anchored in worker control and wealth redistribution.<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThese statistics are not just numbers; they are the lived reality of millions of families going to bed hungry, communities torn apart, and young people denied a future.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThe working class cannot continue to pay the price for a system designed to enrich the few. We must build a new economy that puts people before profit,\u201d read the statement.<\/span><\/p>\n thabo.makwakwa@inl.co.za<\/span><\/p>\n Politics<\/span><\/p>\n The South African Federation of Trade Unions (SAFTU) expressed “deep alarm” over Statistics South Africa’s latest Quarterly Employment Statistics (QES) for the second quarter of 2025, which revealed a continued deterioration in employment levels across key sectors. The QES report showed a troubling decline of 80,000 jobs from March to June 2025, bringing total employment […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":252467,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[19209,868,4365,19210,2290,3408,11776,51],"class_list":["post-252466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-politics","tag-039structural","tag-africa","tag-condemns","tag-crisis039","tag-jobs","tag-loses","tag-saftu","tag-south"],"yoast_head":"\nGet your news on the go. Download the latest App for Android and IOS <\/span>now.<\/em><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"