The mayor of the DA-controlled City of Tshwane, Cilliers Brink, led a protest against racist job quotas and Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) corruption in Nelson Mandela Bay on Thursday morning.
A crowd of unemployed coloured people in DA-branded T-shirts danced to amapiano music in front of the Nelson Mandela Bay City Hall while protesting against what the DA said was racist employment processes and corruption in the EPWP.
In the crowd alongside Brink were former NMB mayor Retief Odendaal, DA provincial chairperson Yussuf Cassim, and DA NMB corporate services spokesperson Annette Lovemore.
Lovemore said the party was fighting to remove discriminatory employment equity legislation, which does not show Nelson Mandela Bay’s actual demographics.
“As long as white, coloured and Indian people are not given a fair chance at a job within this municipality; as long as this municipality continues with its unjust, unfair shortlisting processes that exclude whites, coloureds and Indians, we will continue the fight for what is right,” Lovemore said.
She said that 23% of the city’s population is coloured people, but the municipality employs only 17% of this population.
Lovemore said that every time a coloured person leaves the system, they are replaced by black female employees – which the DA says is unfair.
The party’s leadership said Brink was invited to lead the march and share his knowledge as he had successfully rooted out corruption within EPWP in his metro.
The party claimed that they were reliably informed that there are individuals earning salaries of between R10,000 and R30,000 a month from EPWP funding.
Former NMB mayor Retief Odendaal said he had witnessed this during his time as the mayor.
“There is a database within the municipality which we have not been able to access, and for good reason from the administration side because they want to hide those who have been getting these salaries, but I’ve seen it with my own eyes,” Odendaal said.
Brink said he was there to show the metro how to root out corruption.
“We didn’t ask anybody for a membership card or the colour of their skin, where they live, or their family members. We just said are you in need and can you contribute? And the deal was on-the-job training so that you can leave the EPWP programme with more skills than when you came in,” Brink told the crowd.
Pictured above: Tshwane mayor Cilliers Brinks addressing picketers.
Image source: Anita Dangazele
