Rea Vaya’s recruitment drive on 25 July was a more calmer affair than the previous day when pandemonium broke out.
Hundreds of job seekers had converged on Sankopano Community Centre which turned into chaos, resulting in Rea Vaya decentralising the process into wards.
Ward 105 residents were able to register for jobs at the Altrek sports complex where they submitted their proof of residence and copies of identity documents. Despite the orderly process, the job seekers and those accepting their documents were not aware of the type and number of jobs on offer. The job seekers expressed concern that similar recruitment processes resulted in very few getting jobs from the thousands who had submitted their documents. They expressed worry that the jobs were already earmarked for others and wanted to know what would happen with their documents.
“It would be better if they told us the types of jobs on offer so that only those who qualified submitted their documents,” said Annah Bhengu.
Ward committee members who were observing the process, expressed concern that they were not informed of the decentralisation of the recruitment process so that they could inform more people to submit their documents. Opting to remain anonymous, the members blamed this on poor communication within the ward structure and their councillor. “In many instances, things happen in the ward without our knowledge as representatives of the people, and we are left to resolve problems,” they said.