The figures released by Statistics SA reveal a horror story of unbelievably bad news for workers and the South African economy, said Zwelinzema Vavi on Wednesday.

“Now more than ever we need to declare that we have a national emergency. No country can survive such levels of unemployment and low growth, a situation which is made even worse by the ongoing crisis in Eskom and a drought which has caused agricultural production to fall by 16.6%,” Vavi said in a statement.

Statistics SA released its quarterly labour force survey in Cape Town on Tuesday, which showed that SA’s unemployment rate in the first quarter of 2015 was at its highest level since 2003.

'Outrageous denialism'

Vavi highlighted the expanded unemployment rate which relaxes the requirement for job searchers to be classified as unemployed.

“The more realistic expanded rate which includes those who have given up looking for work now stands at 36.1%, 1.5% higher than in the last quarter of 2014. This means that 8.7 million South Africans who were able to work, were unable to do so.

“What is even more alarming is that on the same day, Statistics SA reported that economic growth in the first quarter of 2015 was a paltry 1.3%, down from 4.1% in the last quarter of 2014. That means the prospect of any early relief for the unemployed is fading fast,” he said.

Vavi launched strong criticism at President Jacob Zuma for telling Parliament on Tuesday that “our country is doing very well”.

“This is outrageous denialism. How can democracy be safe when unemployment is at the level announced yesterday, when 54.3% of people live in poverty and we are the most unequal society in the world? In this real world, South Africa is teetering on a knife-edge.

“More than ever we need to take seriously the many verbal commitments of the ANC and government to prioritise the transformation of our economy with job creation as top priority,” he said.

Vavi was expelled from Cosatu at the trade union federation's last CEC meeting which was held at the end of March after he boycotted meetings in support of his strongest ally the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa), which had been expelled from Cosatu in November.

'Below the usual dip'

Statistician-general Pali Lehohla said South Africa’s unemployment level increased to 26.4%, the highest level since 2003, when it hit 30%.

“It was stable at about 24% since 2003 and this spike is a new phenomenon,” he said at the release on Tuesday.

According to deputy director-general in charge of social statistics Kefiloe Masiteng, “unemployment figures always drop in the first quarter of the year because of the impact of the festive season and Christmas, but this result is below the usual dip”.

The results of the first quarter shows that the working age population was 35.8 million, which included 15.5 million employed, 5.5 million unemployed and 14.8 million not economically active.

“Thus resulting in an unemployment rate of 26.4%, absorption rate of 43.2% and labour force participation rate of 58.6%,” said Lehohla.

News24.com