JOHANNESBURG—David Rosenkowitz (37) is quiet as he packs a box of “family keepsakes” in the lounge of his soon-to-be empty home in northern Johannesburg.
The surgeon’s wife, Salome, looks on, emotionless, her face blank and pale, expressionless, while their two sons tear down a nearby passageway.
“We’re not leaving South Africa because we want to leave; we feel we have to leave,” said Mr. Rosenkowitz.
“Things here have just become too much lately, too much stress. I’m tired of being forced to live in a fortress behind high walls and electric fences.
“Tired of having to spend a fortune on a solar power system because we have a corrupt government that can’t even provide electricity.
“Tired of waking up every morning to hear some radical in a red beret telling me he’s going to take my property away when he becomes president, and telling me how evil I am because my skin’s white,” he told The Epoch Times.
“We’re just tired. We love this country but we just don’t think there’s much of a future here. My brother moved to New Zealand 10 years ago, my sister’s in the UK,” Salome said, before ambling away towards her children. “Now we’re off to Canada.”
According to the latest government statistics, 6 million young people out of a population of about 60 million who should be working, are jobless. Millions more cannot find work.
Economists describe this as a “powder keg” waiting to explode, as it did in July 2021 when hundreds of thousands of unemployed youngsters joined riots that resulted in devastation and more than 500 deaths in some South African cities.
The ANC has acknowledged it has made “mistakes” in its running of the economy, but it blames factors such as the “legacy of apartheid,” the COVID-19 pandemic and “white monopoly capital” for most unemployment.
The ANC’s racially-based employment legislation has also made it difficult for white and mixed-race South Africans, in particular, to find jobs.
The party also has a policy called “cadre deployment,” whereby it rewards loyal party members with top management posts in the public sector, thus freezing more citizens of all races out of the job market.
Opposition parties say the ANC’s pro-labor policies are stifling private enterprise, further eroding South Africa’s ability to create jobs.
One of the party’s biggest alliance partners, and one that normally wins it millions of votes come election time, is the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), the umbrella organization under which most labor unions in the country fall.
An energy crisis that the government hasn’t been able to solve for 16 years is also leading to massive job losses, as businesses—factories and mines in particular—cannot operate without electricity.
The Canadian government recently relaxed its immigration legislation pertaining to South Africans.
Canadian immigration consultant, Nicholas Avramis, told the Epoch Times the North American country had identified a shortage of critical skills, including engineering, tech and finance, and was willing to grant immediate permanent residency to South Africans who had those and who met other criteria.
“The authorities consider your age, and obviously the younger you are, the better. They look at your education credentials and most importantly, they look at your English language proficiency, which is critical, and South Africans traditionally have a competitive advantage here,” said Mr. Avramis.
Public education in South Africa collapsed a long time ago, but its private schools and universities are recognized as “high-quality institutions producing graduates of high-caliber,” he said.
Mr. Avramis added that Canada wanted South African physicians, surgeons and other healthcare professionals, in particular.
“Most countries require healthcare professionals to get recertified, which is a costly and laborious process,” he said. “But the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada recognizes South African education in the medical field.”
The South African Medical Association (SAMA), which represents the majority of healthcare workers in the country, wasn’t able to provide The Epoch Times with exact numbers of doctors and nurses that have emigrated recently to Canada.
But SAMA chairperson Dr. Mvuyisi Mzukwa told The Epoch Times “thousands” were emigrating, at a time when South Africa itself was facing a “critical skills shortage” in healthcare.
He added that local doctors and nurses were increasingly dissatisfied with deteriorating conditions at South African public hospitals.
Mr. Mzukwa said another factor causing an “exodus” of healthcare professionals was the looming introduction of National Health Insurance (NHI). This would compel medical professionals to charge rates determined by the state for services.
Mr. Avramis said South Africans had gained a reputation in Canada since the 1990s as “excellent workers and people.”
“South Africans are extremely hard-working; they’re innovative and smart. I think what has particularly impressed Canadians down the years is South Africans’ willingness to adapt to a culture that’s very different from their own. South Africans are solutions-driven and they’ll find a way.”
Canada is not the only country seeking to attract South Africans.
Germany recently launched a campaign to recruit half-a-million nurses from Africa, with South Africa its prime target.
Rebekka Reichardt, a relocation management consultant with Alfa Personnel Care in Germany, told The Epoch Times: “We have a network of employers all over Germany, so hospitals and nursing homes in 16 states. We can place nurses according to their preference or background, when it comes to medical experience.
“There are some nurses who want to be in big cities, others prefer the countryside. We’ll do the matching process then find the perfect employer for them.”
She said while South African nurses would have to undergo “further training” to certify them to work in German hospitals, and would be required to master basic German before employment, it was generally accepted that they had “above average skills.”
“We must keep in mind South African nurses have seen and dealt with a lot when compared with nurses from most other countries,” Ms. Reichardt explained. “I think they could probably deal, for example, with extreme trauma cases better than some doctors here in Europe.”
Mr. Avramis said a record number of 17,000 South Africans made “formal enquiries” about moving to Canada between January and July this year.
She found that, in the absence of “offsetting measures” taken by government, skilled emigration would reduce long-term growth by 1.2 percent and productivity by 15.8 percent in South Africa by 2040.
“That 1.2 percent sounds like nothing, but in a country like South Africa with all it’s problems, it will have a terrible impact on the economy,” said independent economist Dawie Roodt.
Halstein found that mining and manufacturing, the two bedrocks of South Africa’s economy, would experience the largest losses from skilled emigration.
Other studies have found that skilled emigration represents a significant loss to a country, mainly in the forms of a reduction in the stock of human capital, lower growth and constraining the country’s ability to innovate and adapt new technologies.
Halstein’s research concluded that the overwhelming majority of South Africans emigrating were skilled workers, with tertiary education.
She said South Africans weren’t emigrating for economic reasons, finding that “the main push factor is quality of life, especially safety and security.”
Professor Ann Bernstein, director of the Center for Development and Enterprise in Johannesburg, told The Epoch Times South Africa was now experiencing its “third major wave of emigration” since 1994.
“Emigration increased by 25 percent just after apartheid ended, and peaked at 30 percent in 2000. The next wave happened between 2005 and 2010. Since then, emigration has increased by just over 9 percent year on year,” said Ms. Bernstein.
The latest data from the United Nations Department of Social Affairs shows South Africa’s losing almost 12,000 highly-skilled workers annually.
“We’re now in a third wave of emigration. In the mid-1990s people left because they were apprehensive about how the ANC was going to run the country.
“Now they’re leaving because they’ve actually experienced the ANC’s complete mismanagement of the country.
“They look around at what’s happening and crime and corruption is just getting worse; service delivery is just getting worse,” said Ms. Bernstein.
“Their parents are kind of a ‘lost generation,’ who can’t afford to move overseas. But their children are leaving in droves, because they’re not willing to make the same mistake as their parents and put up with life under the ANC.
“And beyond the ANC, things look even grimmer, with all these radical economic factions rising.”
Ms. Bernstein said while the post-apartheid wave of emigration consisted mostly of white South Africans, the third wave included citizens of all races.
“What really worries me is the tax base,” said Mr. Roodt. “You have people leaving who should form the future tax base of South Africa. They’re going to be paying taxes in America, Canada, and elsewhere. They’re going to be paying taxes to governments that actually deliver services.
“Only a fraction of South Africans pay taxes, and now we have a large proportion of this fraction leaving. So what becomes of us?
“We end up with a government, even a government that’s much better than the ANC, that has limited tax revenue which means it can’t provide basic social services, it can’t build infrastructure. Even it wants to.”
In a rare show of agreement, South African unions and business associations have accused their government of not doing enough to retain skills the country desperately needs.
But government spokesman Pule Mabe told The Epoch Times emigration was a “natural process” and he was “glad” that South Africans were “in demand” internationally.
