Prove Ispani jobs not only for ANC – ActionSA

ActionSA has considered that the party could well be wrong that the Gauteng government’s Nasi Ispani programme is a way for the ANC to hire its own people and a campaign strategy to garner votes for the 2024 election.

But the party said it would not back down on demanding from the Gauteng government the CVs of every individual who is hired to fill the 8 000 posts the government advertised last month.

Nasi Ispani jobs

Director of legal at ActionSA Alistair Shaw said the party has decided to submit a Promotion of Access to Information Act application to the information officer of the Gauteng government to ask for the names and designations of all the individuals hired because of the Nasi Ispani programme.

Shaw said getting that information would ensure that all the people who have been hired meet the requirements for the jobs.

He said if the government refused to give them the information, they would then approach the court to force it to do so.

Lengthy process

Asked how long this process would take, Shaw said it would depend on whether government gave them the information freely.

“It will take some time to consider the CVs, the jobs given to the individuals and correlate whether the CVs meet the job requirements,” said Shaw.

“If an individual has applied for a job, they may be an ANC member but they should qualify and not be given preferential treatment.

“We only have a problem with the allegations that individuals are being overlooked and priority is given to ANC members.”

Creating jobs

ActionSA Gauteng chair Funzi Ngobeni said the party welcomed any genuine initiative to create jobs, but it was not far-fetched to assume the ANC was using the Nasi Ispani programme to garner votes.

“We want to see who has been appointed so that we can see that this is not used to employ ANC branch members.

“These allegations might not be true and we might be found to have made wrong assumptions but we are asking for information to be given to us,” he said.

‘People are not stupid’

“We can’t have a situation where 5 000 ANC card-carrying members are hired for 6 000 available jobs. “There’ll be something wrong there.

If that is the case, we will engage with our lawyers and see what we can do.”

“People have been crying that the government is not creating jobs, suddenly 10 months before the elections there are 6 000 jobs.

“People are not stupid. They can see that these guys are playing politics and using government resources to campaign.”