The recent appointment of 48 Cuban engineers, rather than South African engineers, to improve service delivery in the Free State, is a disgrace. This is according to the trade union Solidarity after the ANC welcomed the Cuban engineers to their provincial headquarters in Bloemfontein.

Dirk Groenewald, head of Solidarity’s Centre for Fair Labour Practices, says that by appointing these engineers, the ANC is conveying the message that they would rather appoint foreigners than their own people, and on top of that, they use South-Africans’ tax money to compensate these appointees for their services. According to Groenewald, the state’s obsession with race and race representivity is to blame for poor service delivery; not  a shortage of competent and qualified workers in the country.

“It is a disgrace that the ANC and the government appoint foreigners rather than utilising the services of the citizens of South-Africa. These appointments will merely ensure that qualified, unemployed South Africans will  be further alienated by the governing party,” Groenewald said.

Issued by Solidarity