Fix South Africa or Face Arab Spring-Like Revolt, Lobbyist Warns
South Africa will face protests similar to those that toppled governments in Tunisia and Egypt in 2011 unless it fixes broken infrastructure, curbs lawlessness and fosters an environment for investment and job creation, the head of a leading business lobby group warned.
“We are in deep trouble,” Busisiwe Mavuso, the chief executive officer of Business Leadership South Africa, which represents some of the country’s biggest companies, said in an interview.
“We need meaningful and targeted interventions that will ensure we don’t end up in the doldrums and we don’t end up as another failed African state.”
A continued deterioration would further erode the social fabric of the country and could spark Arab Spring-like protests, Mavuso said. In 2021, the eruption of the worst civil unrest in South Africa since the end of White-minority rule claimed 354 lives and saw thousands of businesses being looted.
Executives in a World Economic Forum survey ranked “social cohesion erosion” as one of the country’s top-10 short-term risks.
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