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Today’s parliamentary debate, called for by the Democratic Alliance, was an opportunity for the ANC-led government to reaffirm its commitment made to Parliament in 2010, and again in 2011, that a Youth Wage Subsidy would be implemented.

In response to my questions in Parliament yesterday, Deputy President Kgalema Motlanthe assured MPs that we would have clarity on the status of Treasury’s policy during today’s debate.

We hoped, as did the 3.2 million young South Africans who continue to live in poverty and despair, that the ANC would put the interests of young unemployed people above factional politics in the lead up to the ANC elective congress in Manguang.

Instead, a major nail was hammered into in the coffin of the Youth Wage Subsidy by COSATU’s cabinet deployee, Minister Ebrahim Patel, while the ANC did everything possible to avoid the debate at hand.

Today, millions of young unemployed South Africans will be ashamed of the ANC.
Instead of the promise to create 133 000 new jobs, and a policy that could benefit up to 423 000 young people, they witnessed the emergence of COSATU, an organisation with no electoral mandate, as a government by remote control.

President Zuma is clearly no longer in control of his own government, and millions of unemployed young South Africans will have to bear the brunt of his failed leadership.