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Shivambu defends EFF job advert demanding three years’ experience

Economic Freedom Fighters deputy president Floyd Shivambu has defended his party’s advertised jobs that required three years’ experience.

The EFF advertised positions for researchers for its parliamentary caucus in Cape and encouraged women to apply.

Job requirements included a Bachelor’s Degree in Social Sciences, Development Studies, Economics, Law, Public Administration and other equivalent qualifications.

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It also required a minimum of three years’ work experience.

“Applicant must be a member of the EFF in good standing,” reads another requirement on the poster.

The closing date for applications is 25 March.

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The job advert divided social media users, with some advising against the requirement for candidates to be EFF members, while some slammed the party for wanting three years of experience.

Twitter user @mcFuLu1 said: “Am disappointed in you Julius for requiring working experience from an African child. Can’t you hire anyone deserving without asking for experience, please? Place that one on probation and appoint after assessing the performance. Working experience killing us as Africans,” while @bamakhani79 said: “Real colours are starting to show. So much for no experience required advocacy. Red overall additional requirement.”

Responding to the criticism, Shivambu clarified that his party advocated for no work experience, but only entry-level jobs. The advertised vacancies were, however, not entry-level positions.

“The Parliamentary Researchers’ position advertised are not entry level employment opportunities. They’re research positions that require some degree of familiarity with research, speech writing and policy development. For entry-level employment, we will waive the requirement,” he said. 

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Then public service and administration minister Ayanda Dlodlo announced in 2018 that job seekers would no longer need work experience to get an entry-level government job starting in 2019. Dlodlo also introduced a paperless administration across the public service through an e-recruitment system with digital Z83 forms.

She said at the time: “As government, we are concerned that we took long to evolve in this process, resulting in young people, who mostly are techno-savvy, enduring the burden of incurring unnecessary costs when applying for positions in the public service. The world has moved on and the public service needs to keep up and embrace the digital age in all its processes.”

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