 Manyi in Indian slur "Jimmy must be sacked and join the queue of the unemployed in South Africa who are searching for decent work" - Numsa/SACP official GOVERNMENT spokesperson Jimmy Manyi has refused to say whether he will apologise for saying that the number of "Indian" managers should be reduced. During a post-cabinet meeting yesterday, Manyi told the media that he was only prepared to answer questions about Wednesday's Cabinet meeting. "The cabinet did not discuss this matter (the race comments). Cabinet did not pronounce on this matter. Anything else will be pure speculation," he said. On Wednesday the DA released a recording of Manyi telling the Durban Chamber of Commerce last year that "Indians, we should be having only 3 percent (of positions on management). They are sitting at 5,9. I call it the power of bargaining. Indians have bargained their way to the top." Manyi said yesterday he had apologised for earlier remarks - that there was an "over-concentration" of coloureds in Western Cape and should spread out. But when asked if he would apologise for his comments about Indian businesspeople, Manyi said: "That matter did not come up in the cabinet. Let me repeat again: I am here to respond to the issues that were dealt with by cabinet. Anything else that did not happen in the cabinet, I am not responding to," he said. Asked if the cabinet did not even express an opinion on the "raging race debate" taking place in the country, Manyi would only say that President Jacob Zuma had issued a statement from France on Wednesday, saying that nothing unconstitutional will be allowed to happen in SA. On Tuesday, Planning Minister Trevor Manuel called Manyi a "worst-order racist", but Manyi refused to comment on this too. But he said he had met and shaken Manuel's hand at the Wednesday cabinet meeting. But in a sign of the growing outrage from ANC leaders trying to win back Western Cape voters in the coming local government elections, Karl Cloete, the deputy general secretary of the powerful metalworkers union, Numsa, yesterday called for Manyi to be fired. Cloete is also the provincial chairperson of the SACP in Western Cape. "Jimmy must be sacked and join the queue of the unemployed in South Africa who are searching for decent work. Not every dismissal is an unfair dismissal," he said. Cloete referred to the bravery of "coloured" MK fighters Ashley Kriel, Colline Williams, Robbie Waterwhich and Anton Frans during the struggle against apartheid. "It is evidently clear, for me at least, that Jimmy cannot be the face and spokesperson of the ruling ANC government." You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. You can visit the group WEB SITE at http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery options, pages, files and membership. To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected] . You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to this address (repeat): [email protected] . |
