Public sector, municipalities not complying with Affirmative Action, report

THE Namibia Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NCCI), yesterday held a breakfast presentation in Windhoek to declare results of its Affirmative Action Needs Assessment Study aimed at determining companies’ current level of compliance with AA policies.

According to Rainer Ritter and Mihe Gaomab, authors of the study, “big culprits (those not complying) are not so much in the private sector, big culprits are public sector and municipalities”. Of 29 companies around the country that submitted questionnaires for the research purposes, representing some 11 978 employees, 16 companies said they reached the numerical goals set out in legally required affirmative action plans that companies had to adopt for themselves.Only five companies had not met their own requirements while four were partly successful, the research showed.Objectives set out in the AA plans for 2002 -2003 were met by 21 of these companies, with four meeting their objectives partially and three failing.Issues identified that contributed to such results include, “low staff turnover of loyal and good employee of ‘white’ staff, training budget to tight, no proper career planning for management, unavailability of suitable candidates, and a lack of skilled people.These results, however, stand against the Employment Equity Commission’s 2003 annual report which states that “very little progress has been made towards the achievement of the set affirmative action numerical goals, a disturbing decline in the percentage of the representativity of the racially disadvantaged persons at levels of management has now become a distinct factor”.NCCI’s research says “consultants revealed that in some sectors there was a small decline in employment equity on the management level and senior management level, but the overall trend was positive…. it is evident that on middle management level and on the senior management level total employment by all sectors increased for racially disadvantaged and females in numbers and percentages.That some sectors do sometimes show a decline is often due to the economic cycle and thus the performance of the specific sector.”Specifically the number of racially disadvantaged and female managers in the agricultural, construction, transport, private education, manufacturing and public services sectors dropped between 2001/2 to 2002/3.But the NCCI points out that where-as 1868 female managers were employed in the previous financial year, 1925 were employed last year.Also the total number of racially disadvantaged and female managers increased from 5 464 to 5 623, the new research shows.The other section of the research dealt with compliance to the act from local authorities and government ministries.Responses were secured only from local authorities in Windhoek, Tsumeb, Swakopmund and Walvis Bay while the Tender Board of the Ministry of Finance and the municipalities of Keetmanshoop and Otjiwarongo were conspicuous in their lack of response.Only Walvis Bay could provide detailed amounts for benefits affirmative action tenderers received between 200 and 2003.Of 29 companies around the country that submitted questionnaires for the research purposes, representing some 11 978 employees, 16 companies said they reached the numerical goals set out in legally required affirmative action plans that companies had to adopt for themselves.Only five companies had not met their own requirements while four were partly successful, the research showed.Objectives set out in the AA plans for 2002 -2003 were met by 21 of these companies, with four meeting their objectives partially and three failing.Issues identified that contributed to such results include, “low staff turnover of loyal and good employee of ‘white’ staff, training budget to tight, no proper career planning for management, unavailability of suitable candidates, and a lack of skilled people.These results, however, stand against the Employment Equity Commission’s 2003 annual report which states that “very little progress has been made towards the achievement of the set affirmative action numerical goals, a disturbing decline in the percentage of the representativity of the racially disadvantaged persons at levels of management has now become a distinct factor”.NCCI’s research says “consultants revealed that in some sectors there was a small decline in employment equity on the management level and senior management level, but the overall trend was positive…. it is evident that on middle management level and on the senior management level total employment by all sectors increased for racially disadvantaged and females in numbers and percentages.That some sectors do sometimes show a decline is often due to the economic cycle and thus the performance of the specific sector.”Specifically the number of racially disadvantaged and female managers in the agricultural, construction, transport, private education, manufacturing and public services sectors dropped between 2001/2 to 2002/3.But the NCCI points out that where-as 1868 female managers were employed in the previous financial year, 1925 were employed last year.Also the total number of racially disadvantaged and female managers increased from 5 464 to 5 623, the new research shows.The other section of the research dealt with compliance to the act from local authorities and government ministries.Responses were secured only from local authorities in Windhoek, Tsumeb, Swakopmund and Walvis Bay while the Tender Board of the Ministry of Finance and the municipalities of Keetmanshoop and Otjiwarongo were conspicuous in their lack of response.Only Walvis Bay could provide detailed amounts for benefits affirmative action tenderers received between 200 and 2003.