IRR to equity consultants: Will you recommend firing employees who refuse racial classification?
The government blatantly refuses to comply with its racial directives while compelling the private sector to obey.
The Institute of Race Relations (IRR) on 21 May wrote to ten employment equity consulting firms across South Africa to ask for clarity on a core issue of liberty and law: will they advise their clients to dismiss employees who refuse to racially classify themselves under the Employment Equity Amendment Act?
This direct engagement follows the implementation of coercive sectoral race quotas in April 2025, now enforced by more than 50 newly deployed equity inspectors. These officials have been tasked with upholding a system built on mandatory racial categorisation. This policy undermines merit-based hiring, punishes success, and promotes job-killing regulations at the expense of economic growth and personal dignity.
Says IRR Strategic Engagements Manager Makone Maja: 'Not only do the regulations undermine the rule of law, with evidence of the state's unwillingness to adhere to its own rules, but they highlight the challenge of compliance with the draconian and arbitrary red tape they entrench.'
The Commission for Employment Equity recently reported to Parliament that of the 29 269 reports from public and private companies employing nearly 7.7 million people, or 45% of the share of the employed in the last quarter of 2024, only 1.9% of the reports were provided by government entities and state-owned entities.
This demonstrates the state's blatant refusal to comply with its racial directives while compelling the private sector to obey.
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