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Cape Town - South African President Jacob Zuma said government would miss its 500 000 formal jobs target by year-end.
Zuma told Cosatu's tenth annual congress, held in Midrand on Monday, that the jobs plan had been "set back" by the world economic recession.
"The recession will no doubt affect our formal economy targets. The formal economy needs to generate an average 500 000 new jobs annually to halve unemployment by 2014," said Zuma.
"This was achieved in recent years, but has been set back by the recession," he said. He reminded delegates that his government had been formed during a global economic crisis.
"The impact of the recession on key sectors of our economy such as manufacturing, mining, automotive and retail is visible and harsh. Earlier reports indicated that we lost close to 180 000 jobs in the first quarter of the year," said Zuma.
But the labour federation warned government that it had to change some of its "foolish policies" which it said had caused the problem in the first place.
"We are meeting in the middle of the unprecedented crisis of capitalism which threatens to undermine all the gains we have made over the past 15 years," said Cosatu president, Sidumo Dlamini.
"It is not workers who are responsible for this crisis. Workers therefore should not be made, and should never allow themselves to be made to bear the brunt of the crisis," said Dlamini. He said those calling for workers to tighten their belts were "hypocrites".
Zuma said jobs in the formal, mainstream economy should not be confused with the 500 000 Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) work opportunities that he'd promised to create this year in his state of the nation address.
While he did not provide updated figures for jobs created so far by the EPWP, he said the "process of creating those opportunities is ongoing", and funding for the programme was "within the allocated budgets of national departments, provinces and municipalities".
- Fin24.com
