How can we promise guaranteed work?

We are busily transforming our back-of-the-envelope workings below into a fully costed and funded plan that will cover in detail how much the guarantee programme will cost, how it will be funded, administered, implemented, monitored, evaluated and iterated. We will release our plan and model for public scrutiny once it is complete.

What does guaranteed work mean for an unemployed South African?

• You can choose from different half-time jobs (two and a half days a week) paying R2,200 per month or part-time, if you prefer, paying R26 per hour (up to two and half days a week).
• The jobs will be near where you live - jobs that are useful to you and your community.
• Jobs would be, for example, installing renewable energy (e.g. solar water heaters, solar mini grids and wind turbines), construction (e.g. improving schools, ECD centres, public spaces, roads, community buildings, clinics, schools), working as staff in early childhood development centres, schools and community policing.
• You will also be able to choose instead to try to be an entrepreneur or informal trader. You will be paid R2,200 per month during the training period. Once you start trading, you will be paid in the form of cash and stock to sell, and/or equipment to improve or make things.

Cost, funding, administering

We estimate that we will be able to cover around 30% of the cost from re-prioritisation of the national budget, getting better value on current allocations, a higher income tax on top earners and a higher VAT rate on luxury goods.

The other 70% will need to be paid for from a fiscal stimulus averaging 3% of GDP annually over four years. Spent on infrastructure projects, it will grow our GDP up to 4 times more than the amount spent. So, the increase in borrowing in the short term will lead to a decrease in debt to GDP in the medium term.

Progress Updates

Progress Party's first by-elections
Tue 20 July 2023
The party got its first experience of contesting elections in two heated ward contests.

Thaba Nchu branch launched
Tue 4 July 2023
Kagiso Neo Pula and her team launched a Progress Party branch in Selosesha library to help unemployed people in Thaba Nchu.

First two candidates for 19 July by-elections
Mon 26 June 2023
We are contesting wards 7 (Freedom Square) and 49 (Thaba Nchu) in Mangaung. Candidates are respectively: Aphiwe Mzilikazi, a 24-year-old musical social entrepreneur and Kagiso Pula, a 29-year-old mom who wants her daughter to live in a country filled with opportunity for all.

Registration is approved
Wed 14 June 2023
We received our registration approval letter from the IEC.

Registration submission with the IEC
Fri 19 May 2023
Our registration papers were submitted today. We are hopeful of completing the process by the end of June. In the meantime though, we are not standing still. We are launching branches, cultivating leaders, and building a meaningful, active and dynamic home for all who share our values.

Party leadership until our first full members' assembly
Fri 28 April 2023
We will hold a full members' assembly in early 2024 to vote in our leadership. Until then, Progress is being centrally coordinated by an advisory council.

Reached over 1,000 registered-voter signatures
Fri 21 April 2023
It took 5 branch relaunches over a month in March and April, but we got 1,500 signatures in support of forming Progress Party. Of those, 1,086 were registered to vote so we surpassed the threshold of 1,000 to register Progress at the national level with the IEC.

Press

DAILY MAVERICK: Nine million people out of work for more than a year — whither unemployment in South Africa?
By Ayal Belling, 15 November 2023

DAILY MAVERICK: Hundreds of thousands of jobs likely to disappear with Godongwana’s public employment budget cuts
By Ayal Belling, 6 November 2023

DAILY MAVERICK: A job opportunity for every South African – the promise of a new party formed by unemployed people
By Ayal Belling, 21 June 2023

DAILY MAVERICK: An ‘extraordinary and loving’ activist – who was struggling for dignity in Gugs – has been gunned down
By Pamela Silwana, Ayal Belling and Marina Hall, 24 January 2023

DAILY MAVERICK: The high price of economic bumbling and austerity: 64% of working-age people are without jobs
By Ayal Belling (OfW), 2 December 2021

DAILY MAVERICK: Unemployment for black South Africans is worse today than in 1994
By Ayal Belling (OfW), 12 November 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: Local government elections 2021 – a chance to put the ‘public’ back into public institutions
By Pamela Silwana & Ayal Belling (OfW), 28 July 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: Unemployment just before lockdown was worst on record and is expected to get much worse
By Ayal Belling (OfW), 24 June 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: Crisis sees Cape Town suburbs reach across the great social divide
By Pamela Silwana (OfW), 31 March 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: ‘If I tell my daughter there is no hope, I am killing her’
By Pamela Silwana (OfW), 17 March 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: Unemployment scourge: ‘The challenge is macro’ and there is hope
By Ed Stoddard (staff writer), 6 March 2020

WATCH: OfW Gugulethu volunteer, Pamela Silwana, on Unemployment Panel at The Daily Maverick Gathering 2020 at the CTICC
The Gathering, 6 March 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: Reply to Ayal Belling: We are revolutionising government’s approach to youth employment
By Saul Musker (the Presidency), 24 February 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: The SONAs of dead and underfunded ideas
By Ayal Belling (OfW), 21 February 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: Jobless youth one of Ramaphosa’s main priorities
By Sandisiwe Shoba (staff writer), 14 February 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: South Africa's State of Unemployment Disaster
By Ayal Belling (OfW), 12 February 2020

LISTEN: Radio interview with John Maytham on Afternoon Drive
By Ayal Belling (OfW) on CapeTalk, 11 February 2020

DAILY MAVERICK: Using Barack Obama’s organising model to tackle SA’s unemployment crisis
By Ayal Belling (OfW), 21 January 2020

Cultivating leaders

We operate a straight-forward and transparent member tiering which is open to everyone and reflects effort made. The higher the tier of a member, the more leadership options there are available to them. Members can rise up through our tiers through two main types of activities...

1. Party tasks such as: recruitment of new members, registering people to vote, getting the message out about our guaranteed work promise, setting up street and block teams to ensure coverage of an area.
2. Tasks related to improving people's chances of finding work: checking CVs, running workshops on our tools to get CVs out to large numbers of employers, training new volunteers.

Party Structures

Until our first full members' assembly, to be held early in 2024, the party is led by an advisory council.

While we pride ourselves on being a dynamic new party, we do have many recognisable positions within Progress Party, such as...

• national leader of the party
• a chairperson who will have the ultimate responsibility for the internal workings of the party
• a spokesperson, treasurer, fund-raiser, strategist and chief of operations

Thematic teams

While our core message is about guaranteed work for all, we are setting up teams of academic experts, professionals and interested members to focus on all the main areas that need huge improvement in the country, such as...

• Education from early childhood through schooling, tertiary, vocational training and adult education
• Crime, criminal justice and law enforcement
• Health and wellbeing
• Management of the economy
• Migration policy
• Climate, the environment, ecosystem and ecological justice
• Housing and spatial justice
• Banking and finance

Make a Monetary Donation

• Your money will help us broaden our branch and volunteer network.
• Help pay for the logistics and data needed for voter registration, persuasion and get-out-the-vote on election day.
• Fund our election deposits to appear on national and provincial ballot.

By Bank Transfer (preferred)

Any amount would be highly appreciated. No minimum (and no maximum).

• Bank: First National Bank (FNB)
• Account name: Organising for Work
• Account number: 62823353917
• Branch code: 250655

By Card Payment

Thank you for considering a donation. We incur a 3.6% fee when donations are received by card so, where possible, we prefer an EFT.

If you need any assistance, please get in touch on WhatsApp or donate@ofw.org.za

Please note: OfW voluntarily gave up its tax exempt status (exemption number 930067474) as of 1 March 2023 in order to advance PROGRESS as a political party. Effective 1 March 2023, your monetary (or property) donation to OfW is no longer tax deductible.

Contribute Your Time & Skills

Become a branch supporting volunteer or offer your skills, suggestions and knowhow, connections or social capital.

If you're a coder, our website is constantly being developed in response to member needs. It is built in C#, SQL Server, BLOB storage and hosted on Microsoft Azure.

If you have something to contribute, please get in touch on WhatsApp or donate@ofw.org.za

Previous and Ongoing Help

Our many unemployed volunteers run our branches on a daily basis and give our unemployed movement power, compassion and useful services in many communities.

Alastair McKenzie has donated many hours of his time working on our website. He created our CV checker - one of our most utilised functions. It assists volunteers in giving member CVs a thorough review. He has also undertaken a document storage migration for us.

Uta Reinöhl helps us with substantial and thorough editing of our press pieces. She is also a constant source of help on the tone and content of our messaging and is both a font of ideas and tireless sounding board.

Other Ways to Help

Building a new political party is an enormous challenge. We can use all the help we can get!

Donate a Laptop

While we make efforts to ensure our website and workshops work on even the most basic smartphone, it is almost always easier to use a computer for job seeking. As such we are always keen to receive more laptops for use in our branches. We will wipe the hard drive completely. Not just of your personal data but also your operating system will be wiped and the Ubuntu operating system will be installed.

Relationship with Employers

We offer employers candidates absolutely for free. However, many employers don't yet come directly to us to supply them with candidates. We would love your help opening relationships with the talent administrators and HR departments of all the larger employers.