Durban — KwaZulu-Natal’s premier has vowed to clamp down on companies that prioritise the hiring of illegal immigrants, over South Africans that are capable and are unemployed.

Premier Thami Ntuli said that more stringent measures would be taken regarding the hiring of illegal foreign nationals. He was speaking at the special MuniMec meeting held at the Durban International Convention Centre on Friday. MuniMec is a forum chaired by the MEC for Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) and attended by members of the Mayoral Committee (MMCs).

The convention was attended by mayors, traditional leaders and councillors.

Ntuli said that they were looking at tackling issues of employment and exploitation in local industries.

“It has come to our attention that several industries in our province are prioritising the hiring of illegal foreigners over thousands of unemployed but capable locals,” he said.

Ntuli said this practice not only violated labour laws, but it also exploited desperate undocumented foreign nationals, often paying them far below the minimum wage.

“During a recent operation in the Mandeni area, KwaSithebe, some firms shut their doors because they knew that over 90% of their employees were illegal and undocumented. We will conduct further unannounced inspections in these areas to ensure compliance with labour laws and prevent such exploitation,” added the Premier.

According to Ntuli, there would also be enhanced border management and security measures.

“As part of our larger strategy, we will be closely monitoring our border management, ensuring that security is strengthened at all borders to deal with illegal immigrants and undocumented foreign nationals entering the country.

However, Dawie Roodt, Chief Economist at the Efficient Group said hiring illegal immigrants positively impacted the province’s economy.

“The reason for that is quite simple. The reason people are hiring foreigners is because they are cheaper. For example, they are less organised – like the formal labour organisers in South Africa and that means they are less militant and less disruptive and businesses would obviously prefer to employ them,” said Roodt.

He said that a possible solution would be to change the country’s labour legislation to make it more attractive to employ South Africans.

Meanwhile, the Quarterly Labour Force Survey results released last Tuesday by Statistics South Africa for the third quarter of 2024 indicated that the official unemployment rate was at 32.1%.

They said there was an increase of 294 000 in the number of people that are employed to 16.9 million in Q3:2024, while there was a decrease of 373 000 in the number of unemployed persons to 8.0 million. This resulted in a decrease of 79 000 (down by 0.3%) in the labour force during the same period.

Discouraged work-seekers increased by 160 000 (up by 5.0%), and the number of people who were not economically active for reasons other than discouragement increased by 54 000 (up by 0.4%) between the second quarter and third quarter of 2024. Stats SA said that this led to an increase of 214 000 in the number of the not economically active population to 16.5 million.

“The above changes in employment and unemployment resulted in the official unemployment rate decreasing by 1.4 percent points, from 33.5% in the second quarter of 2024 to 32.1% in the third quarter of 2024.

“The expanded unemployment rate in the third quarter of 2024 decreased by 0.7 of a percentage point to 41.9% when compared with the second quarter of 2024,” said Stats SA.

They added that the largest increases in employment were observed in Eastern Cape (83 000), Western Cape (75 000), North West (69 000) and Mpumalanga (49 000), while decreases were only observed in Gauteng (66 000) and KwaZulu-Natal (2 000).

Roodt commended the increase in the employment rates. He noted a growth in the informal sector, adding that he would have preferred a growth in the formal sector.

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