Huawei in Talks With South Africa on Labor Lawsuit

Johannesburg — 

South Africa’s labor ministry says Chinese tech firm Huawei is non-compliant with the country’s employment policies.

Huawei is in talks with the ministry over infringements of the country’s employment policies that require 60% of staff to be local hires. It’s still unclear what a settlement could mean for Huawei and other foreign businesses operating in the country.

The ministry’s employment equity act sets requirements for the number of local hires, including those of disadvantaged backgrounds, at various levels within a corporate structure. And it does regular checks across industries for compliance.

“There is room to employ foreign nationals, especially on companies or employers that come to the country to invest… and also to transfer skills to South Africans. We do allow them to bring 40% of their employees…. We realized that 90% of its workforce, that Huawai is foreign nationals, which is against our employment policies,” says Fikiswa Mncanca-Bede, a lawyer for South Africa’s Department of Employment and Labor.

The labor department launched legal proceedings against Huawei earlier this month.

On Friday, the ministry confirmed it was in settlement negotiations with the tech firm on how to correct the discrepancies.

Huawei did not respond to requests for comment.

Mncanca-Bede says the government’s action should send a signal to all companies that non-compliance will not be tolerated.

“We’re not targeting Huawei, but we’re also coming for the big companies in South Africa, … because we want to ensure that transformation does not just become a talk, but it must be seen as a reality…. Transformation means even if you employ South Africans, who are the South Africans that were employing? Are they addressing the imbalances of the past?” Mncanca-Bede asked.

The employment equity act aims to correct historic inequalities in the country, including racial preferences from the apartheid era that benefited white workers.

But those regulations are still not playing out as planned in the workforce.

“There’s rampant violation of regulations by big companies and small company, and South African companies, not just, you know, these international companies. I would definitely say in relation to all of our labor laws, there’s enforcement problems. I think that the Department of Labor is under resourced,” said Kgomotso Musanabi, a law lecturer at the University of Johannesburg.

In addition to inequities, South Africa is experiencing rampant unemployment, with upwards of 35% of people being jobless.

Musanabi says it’s even worse among the country’s youth.

“I think that government is trying to make an attempt to ensure that all South Africans are employed. But not only that South Africans are employed, but that they acquire sort of globally relevant skills that they need to compete in international markets, particularly tech skills,” Musanabi said.

Companies that are non-compliant face fines.

But labor lawyer Johanette Rheeder says for companies as big as Huawei, those fines are a drop in the bucket and unlikely to have a broader chilling effect.

“In South Africa there’s in many businesses also an attitude of we’ll fix it when we’re caught out. Bigger businesses that’s got a better a better social conscience, if I can call it that, do comply…. The middle size and the smaller businesses who just can’t afford to comply with all of these legislations, so they basically fix it when they offered when they caught out,” Rheeder said.

Instead, she says bridging education and skills gaps in the country — rather than going after foreign workers — is the best way to address unemployment and inequity.

“The biggest, biggest thing that we can do in my view in this country is to upskill people… there are some strategies that [are] in place, but it’s always the struggle between upskilling our local people and not giving jobs to foreigners,” Rheeder said.

The labor department said talks with Huawei are expected to conclude Friday.

The Petronio Álvarez Festival will visit Africa - Cali - Colombia

The Petronio Álvarez Pacific Music Festival will be present from next week at the African Performing Arts Market (Masa).

The organization of the contest, managed by the researcher Germán Patiño Ossa, will bring all its cultural heritage, as well as the richness of its sounds and the ancestrality of its flavors to this event that will take place in the Ivory Coast, from this Saturday until the 12th of same month.

(You may be interested in: The Petronio Álvarez Festival prepares changes in its gastronomic component)

The director of Petronio Álvarez, Ana Copete, explained that el Masa is a cultural platform aimed at promoting African performing arts, whose main purpose is to support issues related to the creativity and productions of black demonstrations.

Given this scenario and as a way to recognize the cultural process that has been advanced since the Colombian Pacific festival, the Masa decided to have it among its guests.

“We are going to have the opportunity to tell programmers from all over the African continent what Petronio Álvarez is and the opportunities for the exchange of knowledge that we have, opening new possibilities of circulation. This is how we are expanding our twinning networks with Afro-diasporic platforms in the world”, affirmed Copete.

(Also read: Scare due to electrical damage in the Departmental Library)

The Cali Secretariat of Culture highlights the leadership of this Cali cultural platform, which, under the direction of Ana Copete, has gained significant momentum since 2020, taking into account the difficulties generated by the pandemic in the world. That is why he assured that he will bring to the Masa the emblematic elements of the coastal culture, as well as his experiences.

Ana Copete, director of the festival.

Photo:

COURTESY ANA COPETE

“Entering these international cultural circuits represents an important step for Petronio Álvarez, who for this 2022 has announced an innovative, powerful version, which is committed to the expansion of culture and the circulation of its artists on the world scene”, they highlight from the Secretary of Culture of the city.

The organization of the Petronio Álvarez Festival is already working on what will be this year’s edition. One of his first decisions was to have a friendly bet with the environment and in its gastronomic component.

“We dream of an oxygenated Petronium and that is why we have coordinated with those who know that the Festival says goodbye to single-use plastic. This is an exercise in responsibility with the planet and pedagogy towards the entire country,” argued the Secretary of Culture of Cali Ronald Mayorga.

CALI

China Appoints New Special Envoy for Turbulent Horn of Africa Region

China has appointed senior diplomat Xue Bing as its new special envoy for the Horn of Africa, a region that is currently troubled by conflict including in Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia.

Xue has previously worked as China’s Ambassador to Papua New Guinea and has experience working in Africa, America and Oceania, China’s Foreign Ministry said on Tuesday.

His task will be to work to promote China’s “peaceful development” plan for the region which aims to help countries in the region “achieve long-term stability, development and prosperity,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin told a daily briefing in Beijing.

China’s foreign minister Wang Yi announced in January during a trip to East Africa that such an appointment had been planned.

China’s interests in the Horn include its naval base in Djibouti, overlooking a key global shipping route. Beijing has granted large loans to landlocked Ethiopia, which relies on Djibouti’s port for trade.

The region is also threatened by instability in South Sudan, where China has substantial oil investments, and spillover from Somalia that has brought deadly attacks in neighboring Kenya.

China's Loans to Sub-Saharan Africa Outweigh Those of Western Nations

Chinese banks provided more loans to fund developmental projects in sub-Saharan Africa than some of the world’s greatest economies combined from 2007 to 2020, according to a new study.

The Washington- and London-based Center for Global Development on Thursday also reported that Chinese development banks provided a whopping $23 billion to finance public-private partnerships in the region.

The figure is more than double the combined amount of $9.1 billion lent by banks in the U.S., Japan, Germany, the Netherlands, France and South Africa, the report found.

“This is well short of what the region needs for roads, dams and bridges,” said Nancy Lee, lead author of the study.

The global think tank examined more than 500 infrastructure projects in the region with a private sector component that reached financial closure during the period.

“There’s a lot of criticism of China, but if Western governments want to boost productive and sustainable investments to meaningful levels, they need to deploy their own development banks and press the multilateral development banks to make these investments a priority,” Lee said.

FILE – A worker works on the electrified light rail transit construction site in Ethiopia’s capital Addis Ababa, Dec. 16, 2014. The project was built by China Railway Engineering Corporation (CREC) and mostly financed through a loan from China’s Exim Bank.

The report also found that despite the 2015 “billions to trillions” vision launched by multilateral development banks, institutions such as the World Bank provided only $1.4 billion per year to fund infrastructure projects in sub-Saharan Africa from 2016 to 2020.

The lack of transparency and use of collateralized loans by China has been of great concern to stakeholders in recent years.

Economists at the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank have warned that several low-income countries face or are already in debt distress.

Lee, a senior fellow at the Center for Global Development, said Western countries have been slow to hike investments despite “much rhetoric.”

“There’s a real opportunity for the U.S. to provide more leadership on infrastructure finance in Africa,” Lee noted.

Some information for this report came from Reuters.

China Exports Its Traditional Medicine to Africa

NAIROBI — 

Hing Pal Singh is among dozens of patients with daily appointments at the Oriental Chinese Herbal Clinic in Nairobi.

Singh, 85, has been suffering from spinal problems for five years and is now trying herbal remedies.

“There is a slight difference,” Singh said. ” … It’s only a week now. It will take at least another 12 to 15 sessions. Then we see how it goes.”

Traditional Chinese medicine is becoming more popular in Africa, according to a 2020 study by Development Reimagined, a Beijing international consulting firm.

A February 2020 op-ed written by a Beijing think tank researcher and published in the state-run China Daily said such traditional medicine would “boost the Chinese economy, contribute to global health and prove to be a shot in the arm for China’s soft power.”

Potential harm

Conventional medical doctors such as Sultan Mantendechere, though, say patients are overlooking the potential harm that some herbal remedies can cause, especially if used too frequently or at too high a dosage.

“They do work in quite a number of circumstances,” Mantendechere said. “Having said that, our main worry as practitioners, the medical practitioners, is that the use of herbal medicine is not as regulated as we would want it to

Although the safety and effectiveness of traditional Chinese medicine is still debated worldwide, herbal practitioners such as Li Chuan continue to gain popularity among those seeking alternative medication.

FILE – In this March 13, 2020 photo, bowls containing prescriptions for traditional Chinese medicine preparations are stacked on a counter at the Bo Ai Tang traditional Chinese medicine clinic in Beijing.

Li said some of his patients were benefiting from purported COVID-19 remedies, although there is scant scientific evidence that they can help against the disease.

“Many people buy our herbal tea to counter COVID-19,” Li said. “The results are good.”

Environmentalists fear the growth of traditional Chinese medicine will encourage poachers to go after endangered wildlife such as rhinos and some types of snakes used in making the potions.

Daniel Wanjuki, an environmentalist and the lead expert at Kenya’s National Environment Management Authority, said that “with people saying that the rhino horn may actually be used as an aphrodisiac, this has led to almost the complete eradication of the rhino species in Kenya and in Africa in general.”

Economical — if effective

Kenya spends an estimated $2.7 billion each year on health care, according to national statistics.

Kenyan economist Ken Gichinga said herbal medicine could significantly lower African medical expenses if proven effective.

“Africans spend quite a lot of money traveling to countries such as India and the UAE to get treatment” and would benefit if herbal medicine “can provide more natural, cost-effective health care,” he said.

In 2021, Kenya’s national drug regulator, the Pharmacy and Poisons Board, approved the sale of Chinese herbal health products in the country. Practitioners such as Li hope that more nations will give approval to Chinese herbal medicine in the future.