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Solidarity addressed a formal request to US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, and to major US shareholders in Bidvest Group Limited, in which this organisation calls for immediate action against a racially discriminatory employee benefits policy of Bidvest that excludes the children of white Bidvest employees in South Africa.

The move comes in the wake of growing public indignation and mounting evidence that Bidvest has implemented a racially exclusive educational support scheme . In terms of this policy, white employees and their children are explicitly excluded from access to certain bursaries and development programmes.

According to Solidarity Chief Executive Dr Dirk Hermann, Bidvest’s racial scheme amounts to systemic racial discrimination that specifically targets children of employees in the lowest income groups. “Instead of supporting all employees who cannot afford school fees, stationery and other essentials for their children’s education, Bidvest decided to exclude vulnerable white children, making the benefits available to the children of black, Indian and coloured employees only, and doing so strictly on the basis of race. 

According to Solidarity, the organisation has approached the US government and US shareholders in Bidvest for the very reason that the current US government is strongly opposed to racial laws, and also because Bidvest has substantial US shareholding. Approximately 25% of Bidvest’s shares are held by US institutional investors, including major US asset management firms. 

According to Hermann, Solidarity has addressed letters to US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and to the CEOs of Westwood Global Investments and Lazard Asset Management. 

Solidarity’s requests include the following:
•    A request to the US government to speak out against racial laws in South Africa, and the discriminatory way in which those laws are implemented. The US government should discuss South Africa’s racial laws during the negotiations for a trade agreement with the US and should insist that such laws be phased out. 
•    The US government should investigate Bidvest’s policy and engage with the South African government at diplomatic level to ensure that such racial exclusion is not enforced or justified by the South African government.
•    US shareholders in Bidvest have been urged to publicly distance themselves from this racially exclusionary policy and to use their shareholder influence to force Bidvest to uphold the principles of equality and non-discrimination.

While the US is actively phasing out Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) policies, South African companies such as Bidvest, often under pressure from the South African government, but increasingly also out of own conviction, are intensifying discriminatory practices based on complete racial exclusion to the detriment of a small white minority.

“We are very positive about the idea of a major company such as Bidvest supporting children of lower-income employees. However, to totally exclude poor children simply because they are white, is unacceptable, and we believe the US government and US shareholders would agree with us in this regard,” Hermann said.
 
The letters also emphasise the reputational risks for US investors associated with passive complicity in racially discriminatory practices abroad and call for an alignment of the values promoted by American institutions locally  and those endorsed by their foreign investments.

Solidarity plans to exert more pressure on Bidvest, but also on other South African companies that are prescribing absolute exclusion of white people, even imposing dictated discrimination against white people, and to rebuke such companies.
 

Issued by Solidarity