The National Employers’ Association of SA (Neasa) has lashed out at the government’s employment equity regulations, which it says imposes “impossible” race quotas.
Neasa and business lobby group Sakeliga on Tuesday wrote to employment & labour minister Nomakhosazana Meth threatening to initiate an urgent interdict if she does not withdraw employment equity regulations implemented this year.
Neasa represents about 7,000 employers in different sectors including manufacturing, agriculture and construction.
“The minister is seeking to force employers to comply with her hiring quotas based on race, sex and disability from September 2025, on penalty of fines as high as 10% of turnover and eventual prosecution of executives,” the organisations said.
The regulations were published after the Employment Equity Amendment Act came into effect in January. Employers have to report based on the new regulations in the reporting cycle starting September 1.
The government implemented the act as part of laws aimed to achieve the ANC’s transformation agenda and contends it was essential at achieving equality in the workplace.
The government faces a legal showdown on transformative laws, including the Expropriation Act, which defines whether privately owned land can be seized for the public good without compensation, broad-based BEE laws and the Employment Equity Amendment Act, which have been challenged in the high court by the DA.
Should the minister not withdraw the regulations by June 18, Sakeliga and Neasa have threatened to take Meth to court to suspend the operation of the regulations and challenge the lawfulness of the Employment Equity Amendment Act.
The organisations were adamant the regulations had “impossible requirements” and were unlawful because the minister “failed to properly and meaningfully consult with the sectors prior to setting the targets”.
“Most strikingly, the hiring quotas, called ‘numerical sectoral targets’ in the regulations, require companies to reduce their white male staff component to as little as 4% in many cases, and usually to under 20%. Other requirements include quotas based on sex, disability and further racial dimensions.”
White male employees
The regulations want to shrink employment of white male employees, Sakeliga and Neasa said, adding that the state seeks to “achieve political goals of demographic representativeness by transforming the workforce and ownership of businesses and organisation in the country into one that reflects the state’s demographic composition”.
“The regulations and the Employment Equity Act (as amended in 2023) establish unlawful, unconstitutional and impossible demands. Their consequence would be severe financial harm to businesses and extensive social harm through economic disruption, increased unemployment and legal uncertainty.”
Meth previously described the legal battle against the act as “anti-transformation”.
“This stance is not only anti-transformation, but also a step backward in the fight for equality and fairness in the workplace,” she said.
President Cyril Ramaphosa, speaking at a Black Business Council event at the weekend, supported the act amid legal contestation.
“Since the advent of democracy, we have built a comprehensive and robust legislative framework to advance the transformation of the economy,” he said.
“The Broad-based BEE Act and the Employment Equity Act are essential parts of this legislative framework. Since these acts came into being, there have been notable increases in black business ownership as well as in the number of women-owned businesses.”
Business Day previously reported the department provided employment equity data for 2024 in parliament which showed white males dominated top companies’ management while blacks were dominant in the lower semi-skilled and unskilled categories. Whites represented 61% of top management in the public and private sectors combined.
Sakeliga (formerly known as Afribusiness) in 2022 won a case against the finance minister at the Constitutional Court on the lawfulness of preferential procurement regulations which introduced criteria for companies eligible to be awarded tender including companies that had a minimum broad-based BEE status level.
The minister initially won at the high court but suffered a loss at the Constitutional Court, which found the minister did not have the power to draft the criteria for the regulation.
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