Capitec’s outgoing CEO, Gerrie Fourie, is set to have meetings with at least six ministers in President Cyril Ramaphosa’s administration as the country grapples with how to unlock the potential of the informal sector.
Fourie, who is stepping down from his role in the next three weeks, said it was important for the country to embrace the informal sector.
He drew praise and scorn last month after he called on SA to rethink its unemployment metric, contending that when the vast informal sector was taken into account, the headline figure of 32.9% could be closer to 10%.
Fourie, who presides over the lender with 24-million clients, on Tuesday said he had had positive feedback from members of cabinet, whom he was set to meet to share his thoughts on the informal economy.
“SA should have one objective, and that is to grow. If you really want to ignite SA, employment is not going to come from the formal sector and government. We have tried that for the past 20 years and nothing has happened. If we really want to get growing, we need to get the entrepreneurs growing,” he said, in one of his last engagements with the media before he steps down.
“We need to make sure our policies and procedures encourage entrepreneurs to grow their businesses and employ more people. We need to find solutions for SA and not be sensitive about 10%. I have about six ministers who have reached out to me and I am going to have meetings with them.”
At least two ministers, Parks Tau, who leads the trade, industry & competition department, and the minister of labour & employment, Nomakhosazana Meth, have publicly come out in support of Fourie’s views.
However, Stats SA has dismissed his views, arguing that the unemployment figures the agency publishes are based on what people say when it conducts regular surveys in society, and its data on the informal economy aligns with requirements of the International Labour Organisation.
Capitec believes the size of SA’s small, medium and micro enterprises is made up of 3-million formal businesses and a further 3-million “emerging” businesses.
One of the impediments to small businesses from growing is SA’s high regulatory and administrative burden. Business Day reported on Tuesday that the government was proposing to cut costs and red tape associated with business licensing to unlock the potential of small businesses via the country’s first national policy-level guidance on general business licensing in SA.
“These are crucial steps in removing barriers that prevent small businesses from formalising, scaling and growing. When government, businesses and communities work together to support entrepreneurship, we unlock meaningful economic progress for the country as a whole,” Fourie said.
The end game is to harmonise national, provincial and municipal business licensing to ensure synergy and alignment with regulations and business licensing bylaws. The proposal to cut regulatory friction could be seen as offering an institutional pathway to formalise that activity.
The national business licensing policy introduces a common licensing framework for the regulation of trade governed under the general business licence which, once approved for implementation, will guide the development and implementation of any business licensing legislation, regulations and systems.
Update: July 1 2025
This story has been updated with Fourie’s comments.
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