While giving examples of how life had improved since 1994, Mdumiseni Ntuli, chief whip of the African National Congress (ANC), claimed that “the number of people with jobs increased from 8- to 14-million”.

Ramaphosa made a similar claim during the ANC’s 2024 January 8th statement and again during his state of the nation address in February. Both times, Ramaphosa claimed that the number of people with jobs increased from 8-million in 1994 to 16.7-million today.

Statistics South Africa’s (Stats SA) now defunct October Household Survey estimated that 8.9-million people were employed in 1994. While it has been criticised for under-representing black respondents, the survey included 30 000 households and the nominally independent black “homelands” or Bantustans in national statistics for the first time.

In 1999, the October Household Survey was replaced by the Labour Force Survey. According to the latest release, which covers the first quarter of 2024 (January to March), an estimated 16.745-million people were employed.

The last time the number of people employed in the country was close to the 14-million figure claimed by Ntuli was the third and fourth quarter of 2021. 

But comparisons should be made with caution

Dr Neva Makgetla, senior economist at the Trade and Industrial Policy Strategies research institute, previously told Africa Check that comparing current and historical employment numbers was not straightforward.

She explained that while the raw number of employed people had increased, so had the working-age population. A more accurate way of looking at the situation is the ratio of those employed compared to the working-age population. 

For the first quarter of 2024, the ratio was 40.7%, approximately the same as in 1994. 

South Africa’s tourism department is tasked with marketing the country as a domestic and international tourist destination.

During the Covid pandemic, there was a decline in revenue from domestic and international visitors due to travel restrictions, which caused a decline in tourism-related revenue and employment.

While explaining that tourism could create jobs, Patricia de Lille, leader of the Good party and minister of tourism, claimed that “in 2023, the tourism sector grew by 49% compared to the previous year”.

Stats SA’s annual report on tourism provides information on residents and foreign travellers who pass through the country’s ports of entry and exit. 

According to the 2023 report, the latest available, 8 483 333 tourists visited South Africa that year, up from 5 698 062 in 2022. This is an increase of 48.9%.

While the number of tourists increased, it has not recovered to pre- Covid-19 levels. In 2019, 10 228 593 tourists visited South Africa.

Access to basic services like electricity, water and sanitation, was an important issue ahead of the May 2024 election, with many communities battling frequent power cuts and planned water shutdowns.  

According to Maropene Ramokgopa, minister of planning, monitoring and evaluation, by 2022 80% of all households had access to electricity, piped water and sanitation. 

Let’s look at the stats for each of these in turn. 

Sanitation

Improved sanitation refers to flushing toilets connected to a public sewerage system or a septic tank, or a pit toilet with ventilation pipes (also known as VIP toilets). 

Stats SA collects data on sanitation through its general household survey (GHS). The 2022 survey showed that 83.2% of households had access to improved sanitation. In 2023, this increased slightly to 83.3%. 

Piped water

According to the 2022 GHS, 45.8% of households had access to piped water in the home. A further 30% had access to piped water in the yard or on site. Just over 10% accessed piped water from a communal or public tap less than 200 metres away, while 2% accessed it from a neighbour’s tap. This brings the total to 88.5%. 

In 2023, the percentage of households with access to piped water decreased to 87%. 

Electricity 

Almost 90% of households had access to mains electricity in 2022. Stats SA defines this as power provided by South Africa’s energy utility, Eskom, or the relevant municipality. This does not include electricity from generators or other alternative sources. 

Although Ramokgopa understated access to piped water and electricity, we rate her claim as mostly correct. 

Unemployment is one of the largest challenges facing the government. During the debate, Pieter Groenewald, minister of correctional services and leader of the Freedom Front Plus, said: “We know unemployment in South Africa, we talk about 42%. When we refer to the young people of South Africa, we talk about 60% of unemployment.”

According to Stats SA’s latest Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS), which covers January to March 2024, the unemployment rate was 32.9%. Groenewald may have been referring to the expanded unemployment rate, which includes discouraged workers, and reached 41.9% in the first quarter of 2024. 

Both the official and expanded unemployment rates increased by 0.8% from the previous quarter. According to Stats SA, this increase is typical. Dihlolelo Phoshoko, director of the QLFS, told Africa Check that it “may be due to the increase in the number of new entrants into the labour market or the decline in temporary jobs created during the festive season in the fourth quarter”.

While Groenevald spoke of young people, “the QLFS defines youth as those aged 15 to 34 years”, Phoshoko said.

Source: Stats SA

Of the 20.8-million South Africans that fell in the 15 to 34 year age group in the first quarter of 2024, 4.9-million were unemployed, 5.9-million were employed and 10.1-million were not economically active (or out of the labour force).

“This resulted in [a] youth unemployment rate of 45.5% according to the official definition and 54.6% when using the expanded definition,” Phoshoko said.

Groenewald may have been referring to unemployment among 15- to 24-year-olds, which was 59.7% according to the official definition. 

Credit bureaus collect individuals' financial data and sell it to lenders such as banks, landlords and other financial service institutions. In South Africa, credit bureaus are regulated by the National Credit Regulator (NCR).

Every credit-active South African is listed with a credit bureau. 

The NCR publishes a Credit Bureau Monitor report every quarter. The latest report, which covers January to March 2024, stated that South Africa had 27.92-million credit-active consumers. 

Since only people above the age of 18 can apply for credit, we reached out to Stats SA for the size of this age group. As of 1 July 2024, it was 42.3-million. This means that 65.96% of South Africans above 18 are listed with a credit bureau. 

Source: March 2024 Credit Bureau Monitor Report

Of the 27.92-million credit active consumers, 63.88% were in good standing. This means they had a current account, had not missed more than one or two instalments, and had no adverse listings or judgments. Just over 11% had adverse listings, the opposite of being in good standing. 

According to the national treasury, increased access to financial products, including credit, is a positive development. However, the way these products are used can be problematic. 

The department found that low-income members of the credit population used unsecured loans, which have higher interest rates, credit cards and retail accounts as their main financial products. Over-indebtedness due to excessive take-up of unsecured credit was identified as a barrier to financial inclusion. 

The National Development Plan (NDP) is a 2012 government policy document that sets out pathways to reducing inequality and eliminating income poverty by 2030. One specific target was to reduce the proportion of people living on an income below R419 per person per month, from 39% to zero. 

While poverty can be measured in different ways, the NDP views it through three levels of income. The lowest, the food poverty line, is the minimum amount needed to buy basic foods with enough calories to survive. The lower-bound and upper-bound poverty lines include additional non-food essential costs. 

Since the prices of these basic foods change over time due to inflation, Stats SA periodically updates poverty lines and estimates how many people fall below these. 

The NDP used data from 2008/09 to calculate its poverty reduction target. In a 2015 report, Stats SA pointed out that since the NDP was published in 2012, it should reflect 2010/11 data, with the updated target of decreasing the percentage of people living below the lower-bound poverty line from 36.4% (or R501 a month) to zero by 2030.

Either way, the country appears to be far from achieving that goal. Stats SA estimated that 40% of the population (21.9-million people) were living below the lower-bound poverty line in 2015. 

While this represents an increase, the percentage is lower than claimed by leader of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), Julius Malema. 

More importantly, there are no more recent estimates of poverty according to the measure used in the NDP. StatsSA told us that more recent poverty estimates are due to be published at the end of 2024, and an updated poverty trends report in 2025. Until more recent data is published, this claim remains unproven.

We recently checked a similar version of this claim from Malema. While it may seem straightforward, there are a few points to clarify. 

First, while “more people” might refer to raw numbers, looking at percentages of the total population means changes can be tracked over time. 

A 2017 report by Stats SA showed that the proportion of the population living below all poverty lines decreased from 2006 to 2011 but rose again from 2011 to 2015. Despite this fluctuation, the overall poverty rate was lower in 2015 compared to 2006, with lower-bound poverty decreasing from 51% to 40%. 

Interpreting data from earlier post-apartheid years is complex due to differing measures and data sources. A 2018 World Bank report concluded that overall, poverty levels were lower than in 1994. Multidimensional measures, which account for additional factors, also point to a decrease in the proportion of impoverished people. 

But this data still cannot tell us about poverty under Ramaphosa’s presidency, which began in 2018. As with the previous claim, more recent data is needed.

Athol Trollip, a member of ActionSA, addressed Ramaphosa directly in his speech: “Last night you claimed that 80% of all passenger rail services are operational again. That is not a fact. It's not true.”

This isn’t exactly what Ramaphosa said. In his opening of parliament address, the president claimed that “around 80% of commuter rail corridors are now back in operation”. 

The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) oversees commuter rail in the country. The organisation is currently trying to recover from several compounding issues. As news outlet GroundUp reported in 2022, Prasa has been plagued by irregular expenditure issues, increasing costs, plummeting passenger numbers and poor quality of service.

In its most recent annual report (2022/23) it set the goal of increasing the number of “recovered” rail lines “to 32 by the end of 2023/2024 – an effective 80% of total capacity”. This would mean restoring 10 out of 40 passenger rail lines by the end of the next financial year, a target that Prasa expected to exceed.

Speaking at the 2024 Africa Rail conference in June, Prasa head Hishaam Emeran said that 31 rail corridors had been restored to operation. This would be around 77.5% of the total of 40. An April 2024 Prasa press release described the 31 lines as being in “partial operation”. Emeran said at the conference that 24 months earlier only four corridors had been operational. 

Describing these 31 corridors as “around 80%” of the network total – as Ramaphosa did – is less precise, but not untrue. This matches not only Prasa’s expected goals but also its most recent public updates.

The national housing needs register, or NHNR, is a central database where South African households can register their current housing conditions and request assistance from the government in addressing their housing needs. It was implemented in 2017 by the Department of Human Settlements. 

The source of this claim is likely an answer to a parliamentary question published in March 2023. In response to the EFF’s Mandisa Makesini, minister of human settlements Mmamoloko Kubayi released a breakdown of the number of households registered on the NHNR and not yet assisted by the government.

In total, the department said there were 2 456 773 households on the NHNR. The overwhelming majority (1 030 099) lived in the Gauteng province. 

Mphithi’s claim is therefore correct. More recent figures have not been released. Africa Check contacted the Department of Human Settlements for an update and will share their response when we receive it.