09 February, 2012 06:38
2 Comments

Penwell Dlamini and Kingdom Mabuza
Sowetan

'All we want is jobs'

President Jacob Zuma is to deliver his State of the Nation Address today in Parliament, where he will inform the nation about his government's programmes.

Last year Zuma promised to create jobs without setting a target, and later admitted that his government did not manage to implement its promise.

Yesterday, Cosatu called on Zuma to announce concrete steps on rolling out five key priorities contained in the ANC's election manifesto.

The labour federation said his address should give clear indications of when his government will fulfill the promises of creating decent jobs, providing good education, health, rural development and the fight against crime and corruption.

Yesterday, Sowetan spoke to 10 unemployed citizens who also agreed with Cosatu that they needed jobs.

"All we want from President Jacob Zuma is jobs and nothing more," said Sam Salani, who joins a group of other unemployed men on the road- side and intersections hoping to find piece jobs every morning at 6.40am.

Salani, 59, of Florida, western Johannesburg, has not had a job since September last year.

Like any other day, he woke up yesterday and sat at the corner of Westlane and Hull streets in Florida hoping to find a piece job.

He carried a poster stating his skills: waterproofing, painting and tiling. Salani needs to work to feed two of his children, aged 17 and 20, who are still at school.

Less than a kilometre from Salani was Walter Mulaudzi, 37, of Braamfischer, Soweto.

Mulaudzi worked for the Makhado municipality in Limpopo for six years and later worked at a filling station in Northcliff. He was retrenched in 2008. Since then, Mulaudzi has lived on piece jobs.

Yesterday, he was standing at the corner of Kilburn and Paul Kruger roads in Florida.

"If he [Zuma] can have a plan to create jobs, I will be happy. That is all I want from him," Mulaudzi said.

"I walk from Braamfischer to this place without anything to eat. If I am lucky to get a job it can pay R120 or R100 a day."



COMMENTS

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Investor44 Feb 9, 2012

The frustrating thing is that there is so much potential in SA - unemployment should be below 10%, not above 25%. All government has to do is figure out how to unleash this potential, and its certainly not going to happen by entertaining/debating Malema/Mugabe style policies - for goodness sakes man, unemployment in Zimbabwe is 95% !
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Investor44 Feb 9, 2012

Another Message for Zuma: 2000 years of history has taught us : Thebest way to build internal unity and resolve internal conflict, is to find a common external enemy. Now I'm not talking about ANC vs DA. I'm talking all South Africans united against common enemies. So what who are these common enemies we can work together to defeat ? Here are some ideas:
1. Unemployment.
2. External competition i.e. other countries competing for global capital required to create jobs and growth.
3. Countries we need to beat to qualify for the next football world cup !
4. Countries we need to beat to win the next rugby world cup !
5. Bad teachers (remembering there are plenty of good ones too).
6. Criminals.
7. Corrupt officials(all parties).
8. Countries which are beating us in terms of growth and job creation.
9. Tax dodgers.

Viva south Africa Viva. Viva Zuma Viva.