HOME AND ABROAD
JUSTICE MALALA: Fiddling the numbers
Our politicians would like nothing more than to exaggerate growth and job creation — so we can’t let them anywhere near Stats SA
The most important aspect of the debate about South Africa’s unemployment rate is being lost in the noise: keep the politicians as far away as possible from the statistics services.
If there is indeed something wrong with the unemployment numbers, as Capitec CEO Gerrie Fourie has suggested with his claim that unemployment is closer to 10% than the official rate of 32.9%, then let’s get some big brains in a room and help Stats SA fix the problem. But please, please, keep the politicians out of the whole thing. If politicians start fiddling with the numbers, or having control over them, or the institutions that work on producing statistical data, then the country is doomed...
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