Media Statement: The Employment Equity Act – Employers are in a strong position against the state

Employers are in a strong position in 2025 and beyond to avoid implementation of hiring quotas under the Employment Equity Amendment Act (EEAA).

While the Minister of Labour gave notice last week that the EEAA will take effect on 1 January 2025, her department is in no position to enforce it. The amendment act is designed to require that every workplace in South Africa should reflect at every level the demographic profile of the state.

First, comprehensive legal challenges by Sakeliga and others to counter the EEAA and forthcoming regulations are on the way. Second, the department and state in general lacks the capability and resources to police employers at the scale required. Third, because the amendment act demands both the impossible and the unethical, most businesses will continue to avoid and defy it with clear consciences.

Sakeliga encourages businesspeople to remain firm and not make any changes to their employment policies for the sake of the EEAA. Businesses should prepare for maximum achievable non-cooperation with an irrational, harmful, and unconstitutional act for as long as it takes to have it scrapped or rendered practically impotent.

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Our Mission & Impact

Sakeliga will litigate on the broader legislative and policy issues in the EEAA and its regulations. We recommend that businesses seeking advice on their specific circumstances contact and consider joining the National Employers’ Association of South Africa (NEASA).

International implications

Unsurprisingly, the EEAA’s racial profiling and social engineering is plainly illegal in many countries. Reservation to accede to unreasonable state demands will be the norm for international investors and companies who not only resent being told who to employ but who might also face prosecution or penalties in their home countries for complying with race-laws abroad.

How businesses can help Sakeliga

Businesses with more than 50 employees (or soon approaching this number) are invited to contact Sakeliga with information that may help our legal preparation. The following would be particularly valuable:

1. Employers who have received penalties or threats of penalties for non-compliance with the targets in an employment equity plan.

2. Employers who are unwilling to make determinations on or find it genuinely difficult to attest to the race of their employees.

3. Employers that are precluded from race-based hiring and firing by other requirements, possibly in other jurisdictions, such as foreign legislation or codes of conduct.

4. Employers who cannot or strongly wish not to comply with racial or other employment quotas, such as family businesses, women-run businesses, businesses characterised by religious, ethnic, or local demographic dimensions, and so on.