Employment Equity

Employment Equity (formerly called Affirmative Action) is the description used by the South African Government to describe their policy of disadvantaging people and companies based on race. This has been steadily introduced after the 1994 democratic elections which gave the black majority complete control of the country and its government.

Strict policy has made it extremely difficult to employ white people, forcing employers to (in any given case) employ a "Previously disadvantaged" (black) candidate regardless of skill or suitability. This extends to the upper-level corporate space, where large government grants are granted to companies who can prove that they enforce employment equity. (So-called Black Empowerment Companies.)

Though the socio-economic impact is possibly as serious as that of the notorious Apartheid enforced by the pre-1994 government, its enforcement has gone seemingly unnoticed by the international community. Though the South African Constitution (implemented by the current government) states that it is illegal and unconstitutional to discriminate on the ground of race, this movement has nothing but grown, to the point of embracement (and sometimes even abuse) by the corporate sector.