In a statement, following a proposal by the Democratic Alliance (DA) earlier this week to alter South Africa’s empowerment laws to focus on poverty and not race whilst aligning public procurement policy to value for money, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) has said: “it remains steadfast in its support for the progressive objectives of BBBEE [broad-based black economic empowerment] and remains convinced of its fundamental necessity for a country still struggling to overcome 350 years of systematic discrimination under colonial and apartheid rule.”

“As long as South Africa remains scarred by the painful legacies of exclusion, then transformation legislation such as BBBEE and Employment Equity will continue to be critical tools to overcoming our still entrenched levels of poverty and inequality,” the trade union federation said.

COSATU added: “We are dismayed that the DA has chosen to raise long debunked fairy tale claims by William Gumede that BBBEE has seen R1 trillion handed over to 100 politically connected persons yet cannot say who these individuals are nor where the monies came from. It is unhelpful for the DA to dismiss the many gains of BBBEE under government led by the African National Congress which have begun to chip away at racial inequalities. We are surprised that the DA has jumped upon the demagogic bandwagon of conflating BBBEE with billionaires and ignoring the millions of ordinary South Africans it has benefited.”

“The objectives of BBBEE are sacrosanct. Where modalities need to be enhanced or implementation challenges addressed, then sober discussions must be held at Nedlac [National Economic Development and Labour Council] and Parliament. However, these must be anchored upon accelerating not abandoning the nation’s constitutionally mandated transformation journey,” COSATU concluded.