The country has the world's highest unemployment, leaving many cynical about this month's election.
Hundreds of South Africans have turned up at the job fair, CVs and school certificates in hand, hoping that they may get their big break.Forget the high politics and low skulduggery playing out between the country’s leaders ahead of the 29 May general election, the government-organised job fair in Durban's Umlazi township is where one of the main issues on the minds of ordinary people is on display.
Zara, 44, just got retrenched. She has no kind words for the ANC, a party she has always voted for after it led the campaign against white-minority rule.The state of the economy is certainly one thing that has got people considering political alternatives.But in their everyday lives, young South Africans are doing what they can to get themselves in the right position to get a job.
“I think it’s going to be a bit of a challenge finding resources,” she says but she will give it a go anyway.The Catholic Institute of Education of South Africa runs this centre and 25 others like it across the country. The years of the racist system of apartheid skewed the economy. It not only embedded huge wealth disparities but also inequalities in education and skills training.
“There needs to be a serious alignment of what is going on in the academia, in the universities and mid-level colleges with the labour market,” admits Mr Nxesi. “A lot of people that are coming out of the education system and into the workforce simply don’t have the skills and also the acumen and the readiness to go into the workplace.”Like the one in Durban, the government has been running jobs fairs across the country for four years now.
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