Letters; Exploiting Youth Unemployment

I note in Business Day 10 August 2011 several references from various commentators to the “ticking time bomb” that is the unemployed youth In South Africa. That there is reason for grave concern about this is beyond doubt. But when it comes to using this” time bomb “ as a threat for the adoption of economic policies, nationalisation included, a very large dose of scepticism is necessary. First, the time bomb, should it explode, will take all of us down with it, not just the capitalists; second, there is no revolution in history that has ever been successfully led by the unemployed poor – it always come from the middle class, the Malemas of this world. Third, no current political party encapsulates the needs of the unemployed youth, as the increasing number of apathetic voters shows, and fourth, such sufferings are experienced in other African countries with much bigger “time bombs than ours, endured in Southern Africa with stoic resignation and a well armed military and police force. Zimbabwe is a case in point. The “lumpen proletariat”, should it ever unite and rise up, will be shot. Instead, the threat of the time bomb is incessantly used to bully business to endorse suicidal policy options and radical transfers of assets to the new elite, who are neither unemployed or poor. So we have a real problem, but it is trivialised in the way commentators use it. We should not allow people to hide their agendas behind the real sufferings of the truly poor.




Dr Gavin Lewis
DA MPL Gauteng Legislature
Spokesman: Economic Development
Deputy Spokesman: Finance