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Despite the fact that it has not ever made a job target it has set itself, the ANC has pledged to create an extra 275 000 jobs a year by boosting local demand and by the investments coming in mining, manufacturing and agriculture.
Jobs are at the centre of the governing party's manifesto for the 2019 election which was launched on Saturday in Durban. Officials say that jobs emerged at the top of the concerns by constituency meetings the ANC has been holding around the country.
South Africa's unemployment rate of nine million South Africans "is a tragedy of vast proportions, a direct challenge to the promise of our democratic Constitution and the cause of great hardship and despair," said President Cyril Ramaphosa.
In addition, the ANC has again promised to use muscular de-concentration policies and practices to open up the economy.
Investment target goes over R1trn
The ANC manifesto says: We remain steadfast in the national ambition to raise R1.2trn worth of investments over five years to drive job creation, the eradication of poverty and bringing about a more equal society.
The government has made good progress on getting investment pledges from the business community and it has increased its own target.
Land expropriation as a last resort in a package of reforms
Land expropriation without compensation has made it into the ANC manifesto, but it is not the top item on the agenda. That poll position goes to jobs and expropriation is presented as a policy of last resort.
While former President Jacob Zuma has echoed the EFF support for the nationalisation of land, the ANC manifesto says: "we will continue to promote a range of land ownership forms – public, private, cooperative, family and communal."
Workers to become owners
While the party's manifesto incorporates the market-friendly ideas that Ramaphosa has stewarded since coming to office in February last year, it adds a new focus: "Our plan for broadening ownership promotes mixed ownership of the economy, with a focus on extending worker ownership across the sectors of the economy."
Big retailers out of townships and villages
Ramaphosa also spoke extensively about invigorating township and village economies as he unveiled the party's manifesto for the election - likely in May 2019.
Big retailers running branches in townships should watch out for new regulation: "To further support township and village enterprises, the ANC government will step up the enforcement of measures to prevent illegal trading and selling of counterfeiting and unsafe products. We will prevent displacement of local enterprises by big retail stores and will ensure that small producers have a place in their retail value chains.
"To this day, townships and villages remain dormitories for most of our people, far from economic opportunities and often without adequate social amenities," said Ramaphosa who promised targeted enterprise creation opportunities and an end to illegal trading.
Data must fall
Ramaphosa said data prices had to fall, for which he won huge applause. On Monday, Fin24 starts a running investigation into the cost of data and mobile telephony.
