Floyd Shivambu plans to solve black poverty the same way “white poverty was uprooted”

President of the Afrika Mayibuye Movement, Floyd Shivambu, explains that the party is advocating for the current government to undertake a commission of inquiry into “what causes black poverty.”

He explained during a press briefing on 3 December that this inquiry would use the apartheid government’s eradication of white poverty as a blueprint for the programme.

“They understood the cultural, psychological, social, economic, and political presence and manifestation of white poverty, and they uprooted it permanently and intergenerationally,” said Shivambu. 

“We are trapped in intergenerational poverty, and there seems to be no solution out of it. That is why we need to pay dedicated attention to how we uproot the deep sense of multi-dimensional black poverty that exists in South Africa.”

Shivambu is referring to the Carnegie Commission of 1932, which was set up by the South African government to investigate the causes, consequences and corrective measures of the “poor white phenomenon.”

According to a research paper published by Economics Professor Johan Fourie from Stellenbosch University, the commission was set up when “the severe poverty of the white poor became much more evident.”

The commission’s report encompassed five volumes that focused on economic, psychological, educational, health and sociological facets of the “poor white problem’.

The report reccomended that “employment sanctuaries” be established for poor white workers and included recommendations for education and segregation. 

Fourie said that, while many believe the commission and the subsequent “Pact government policies” that were implemented solved the problem of poor whites, the drop in poverty can be attributed to other factors. 

This includes the sharp increase in the price of gold in 1932, and the creation of additional jobs in the industrial sector during the war.

Shivambu argues, however, that the multi-dimensional understanding of white poverty affecting a particular race that the commission gained led to the results.

He said this can be replicated “by understanding the nature of the poverty question in our communities but also by sourcing the solutions from the people on the ground.”

Resolving black poverty by 2045

Specifically, he said that collecting information from citizens today, which formed the basis of the Carnegie Commission’s work, can provide valuable information and solutions for black poverty.

For example, he mentioned that the party met with small-scale farmers in Jozini, who stated that if they were provided with an irrigation scheme, they could hire more workers and better sustain their households. 

“They could then sustainably escape the ‘absolute poverty’ bracket,” he said. “They are fully aware of what needs to be done; the problem is that no one is listening.”

When a journalist suggested that the current government is unlikely to undertake this commission, Shivambu said the party would then do it itself. 

“Mayibuye, in 2029, will be a governing party in South Africa, so if our call falls on deaf ears of our current government, then we will take it upon ourselves,” he said. 

The party plans to have “resolved all the poverty issues of South Africans” by 2045. He added that a key part of achieving this will be deploying men and women with the necessary skills.

“Not what is happening now, where people just take anyone from the streets because they are comrades and they deploy them into strategic positions,” he said.

Before forming the new party, Shivambu was fired as secretary general of Jacob Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MK Party) in June.

Shivambu joined the MK party in August of last year after over a decade in the EFF.

The founding deputy president of the far-left party since 2013, Shivambu was seen as the EFF’s ideological guru before his defection post 2024 general elections that saw the EFF’s support dip.

During his time at the Red Berets, he served as its long-time number two and MP.

His new party, the Afrika Mayibuye Movement, has been rocked by infighting, having had to recently reshuffle most of its leadership positions after losing both of its deputy presidents in the space of two months. 

Shivambu took the recent press conference as an opportunity to explain that the exits were not voluntary resignations, but “recalls” initiated by the party for incompetence.