It’s been 68 years since 20,000 women marched to the Union Buildings in Pretoria, sparking one of the most famous women’s rights milestones of the 20th century. The massive changes ushered in over the decades that followed fundamentally transformed the role of women in South African society.
However, while apartheid’s policies are no longer our primary opposing force, there are still battles to fight. Women are persistently undermined by gender stereotypes and patriarchal norms. We face educational, social and economic barriers to entry and success. We’re more likely to perform unpaid work and are underrepresented in positions of leadership. And the scourge of domestic violence, sexual violence and femicide seems to be getting worse, not better.
As we look to the past and the achievements made to date, it’s equally important that we interrogate the present and endeavour to create an even better future. A critical part of this work, I believe, is education.
Winnie Madikizela Mandela has always been an inspiration for me. While I am aware that there are polarising opinions of her legacy, I have long been impressed by her journey, from humble beginnings, to becoming one of the most prominent social and political figures in South Africa’s history. A woman and mother, a fearless leader, and a fighter for the poor and marginalised, she promoted courage, hope and change during the country’s darkest days. Her words and actions influenced several generations of female leaders and continue to guide those striving for peace and prosperity today.
Winnie Mandela was also passionate about education — and about the education of women in particular. She believed education was essential for women’s empowerment and liberation, and that educated women were better equipped to lead and uplift their communities.
This philosophy guides me in my work in the education space, reminding me of my commitment to exceed expectations, deliver on my promises, and care about the people I serve — just as Winnie Mandela did. Looking to the past helps us remember the most important traits we need to carry into the present.
In South Africa today, girls are more likely to drop out of school than boys because there is not enough money for school fees or due to family commitments. Among adults, illiteracy rates are higher for women than they are for men, which affects their ability to further their studies and access employment. This makes it harder to break traditional gender roles, cycles of poverty, and broader systems of inequality.
In rectifying legacy issues and striving to correct more recent injustices that have emerged, we have to put education first.
We must identify the challenges that girls and women face in accessing — and sustaining — an education and put meaningful interventions in place to address them long term. We need to adopt a view of education that goes beyond childhood and adolescence and into adulthood. There are still options for adult women who didn’t complete a matric, or who are lacking the critical skills they need to apply for work or start businesses of their own. These avenues need to be communicated to the women who need them most.
Work readiness, skills development, short courses, learnerships, and workplace training programmes. These essential offerings open doors that benefit not only the women who complete them, but the companies who employ them, and the families and communities of which they are a part.
Combine these workplace programmes with critical changes in quotas, mandates, policies and legislation and we might begin to move the needle on female empowerment in South Africa. These adjustments need to be undertaken systemically — not in silos, but across sectors; not just locally, but nationally. Radical transformation requires radical intervention, and if we are to build on the momentum of women’s rights begun nearly 70 years ago, we need to be bold.
Winnie Mandela once said, “If you are to free yourselves you must break the chains of oppression yourselves. Only then can we express our dignity, only when we have liberated ourselves can we cooperate with other groups.” The key to this, I believe, is education. Let’s be relentless and assertive in how we talk about female empowerment, and let’s make sure that it places the education of women first. Our future depends on it.
Nontando Aina is the Marketing Manager of Optimi Workplace, a division of the Optimi Group, one of South Africa’s leading names in the education and training industry.
This media release has been distributed on behalf of Optimi Workplace by Fox Street Communications. For more information, interview requests and images, please contact Lauren Hills on lauren@foxstreetcomms.co.za.
As we celebrate Youth Month this year, 30 years after the birth of democracy in South Africa, it is a poignant time to recognise how far we’ve come and where we need to go to uphold the freedom and potential of the youth of South Africa.
On paper, the numbers don’t look good. There is a generation of unemployed people in South Africa, who are not in education, employment or training (NEETS). The gap keeps growing as the levels of unemployment keep increasing (36.35% in 2004 and 50.47% in 2023).
However, there are glimmers of hope and progress that should not be overlooked. And there is a generation of young people who need to remember, and recognise, that they are important, they have agency and they have the potential to turn the page and write a new chapter in their story.
The challenges, as we know, are many. However, the required solutions to the prevailing problems are not complicated.
When we talk about systemic changes and big bucket solutions, we tend to (unintentionally) dehumanise the lived experiences of many young people who are locked out of the economy. The millions of young people who are NEETS represent real lives with broken aspirations and disillusionment.
While we try to solve the problems for the millions, we must recognise the individuals who make up the scary numbers. If we put the young person’s lived experience front and centre, we will solve the most pressing challenges with them. Not for them, but with them.
Some of the highest barriers to employment include a lack of access to transport, so young adults are not able to look for employment and attend interviews, or gain valuable in-person work experience. Another issue is a lack of work-seeking support and limited access to relevant, quality skills development and training.
I believe that the public and private sector can co-create employment and self-employment opportunities that are curated for young people who are looking to transition from economic exclusion to inclusion.
The foundational skills, generically required by the economy of today and the future, are also often lacking. These include basic numeracy and literacy, as well as digital and social skills. When we think about solving this issue for a generation of young adults, it seems impossible, but if we look at it from the perspective of one person at a time it is achievable. And it must be achieved.
In recent years, there have been some fundamental, and positive, shifts in policy and advocacy in South Africa. These include the removal of barriers to entry in work experience requirements, the creation of a national minimum wage, as well as giving young South Africans the ability to learn while working, through programmes such as Learnerships, for example.
However, more needs to be done, to not only implement the policies and standards more consistently and coherently, but also to carve out new frameworks that support our youth in their learning and career goals.
I would argue that it’s not stricter enforcement of regulation that is needed, but rather a drive from inspirational, intentional leadership who aim to connect employers to a greater cause for the success of our country, inspiring them to remove barriers and assist young people to enter our economy.
While opportunities for the majority of young people in South Africa are constrained, it is still those who stand out from the rest who have a higher chance of rewriting how their story continues.
Matric results and post-school education still matter, but beyond the grades, young people can hone the following skills for a greater chance of success. I urge young South Africans to:
This Youth Month, I urge us to take a moment to realise that while the problems persist, so do the solutions. Not all is broken, and together, as the public and private sector, we need to work with young South Africans to understand their challenges and move forward with the solutions.
Sylvester Mokubedi is the Head of Sales & Marketing at Optimi Workplace, a division of the Optimi Group, one of South Africa’s leading names in the education and training industry.
This media release has been distributed on behalf of Optimi Workplace by Fox Street Communications. For more information, interview requests and images, please contact Lauren Hills on lauren@foxstreetcomms.co.za or +971 55 118 5233 (WhatsApp messages).
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