Minister of Labour and Employment Nomakhosazana Meth. (File photo)
The department of employment and labour has rejected claims by the Democratic Alliance (DA) that the Employment Equity Amendment Act, which came into effect in January 2025, has sectoral racial quotas.
In April, the DA said it had filed an application in the Pretoria high court challenging the employment equity quotas in the Act which it says are merely “racial exclusion under a new name”.
But labour department spokesperson Pertunia Lessing, told the Mail & Guardian that the Act “does not have quotas”.
The DA, whose challenge will be heard in the coming weeks, says the new amendments will “make employers self-implement sectoral racial quotas”, which give employers the right to identify and record an employee’s race if the employee chooses not to disclose it voluntarily.
In a written reply to a DA question in parliament, Employment and Labour Minister Nomakhosazana Meth said the amendment was meant to ensure “reliable, existing historical data”. This would mean that an employee would either need to disclose their family history, which is considered personal information, or have their race assumed.
DA spokesperson on labour Michael Bagraim said Meth’s “generic” definitions of persons of colour cannot stand in a democratic South Africa.
“This is a preposterous suggestion and appears to expect employers to conduct race inspections to tick a box, in order to avoid being fined,” he said.
According to the Employment Equity Act, “black people” is a generic term that includes African, coloured and Indian people. This definition in the Act has not been amended since 1998.
According to the 2025 amendments, employers with 50 or more workers are required to ask each worker to fill out a form to declare their occupational level in terms of race,
gender and disability status information.
If an employee refuses to fill out the form or gives incorrect details, the employer is allowed to use reliable past or current information to determine the person’s race, gender or disability status. This process must be done at the workplace and is the employer’s legal duty.
The DA accused the minister of not conducting a formal investigation based on evidence to establish the employment equity regulations, saying this would push the country’s already high unemployment rate — officially at 32.9% — even higher.
“South Africa continues to be one of the most unequal nations on Earth, with more than eight million South Africans unemployed and a small elite enriched, making the evidence against employment equity regulations undeniable,” Bagraim said.
The Act as amended further sets hiring quotas for 18 economic sectors, from mining and transport to construction and agriculture, in a bid to increase employment opportunities for “designated groups” including black people, women and people living with disabilities.
The DA noted that South Africa no longer uses the Population Registration Act, an apartheid era law that required every citizen to be classified by race.
“It cannot stand that employers become racial classification agents,” Bagraim said.