Committee wants tough action for employers breaking the law

By Simon Nare

Portfolio committee of labour and employment chair Boyce Maneli has called for stricter laws to force employers to hire South Africans ahead of foreign nationals, saying the current laws are lenient.

Addressing Parliament’s weekly committee media briefing in Cape Town on Thursday, Maneli said employers who hired undocumented foreign nationals were fined R2500 per person.

He said this was a drop in the ocean for some of the companies, who made billions in profits.

“We need to emphasise that they are not deterrent at all and we need to relook at them. It’s the task that the legislature must look at. We are engaging the ministry in this regard with an understating that there is a need to look at the law differently.

“The issue about fines as you put it in the legislation, each time you have to make such a determination, it is an amendment