Neva Seidman Makgetla (born 1956) is an American–South African economist who is currently attached to Trade & Industrial Policy Strategies, an independent think tank based in Pretoria. She rose to prominence as the head of the policy unit at the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) between 2000 and 2006. She was a member of the National Executive Committee of the ANC, Cosatu's Tripartite Alliance partner, from 2019 to 2022. During apartheid, Makgetla was an academic economist with close ties to the exiled African National Congress (ANC). She moved to South Africa during the

democratic transition Democratization, or democratisation, is the transition to a more democratic political regime, including substantive political changes moving in a democratic direction. It may be a hybrid regime in transition from an authoritarian regime to a full ...

and subsequently became a key figure in debates about post-apartheid

labour policy Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

. Before her seven-year stint at Cosatu, she was an economist on the

Reconstruction and Development Programme Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) is a South African socio-economic policy framework implemented by the African National Congress (ANC) government of Nelson Mandela in 1994 after months of discussions, consultations and negotiations ...

, both during the development of the policy and during its implementation through Jay Naidoo's ministerial office. Elsewhere in the civil service, she has worked for the Department of Labour, the

Department of Public Service and Administration The Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA) is a department of the South African government that is responsible for the organisation and administration of the civil service. It is responsible for matters including labour relations ...

, the Development Bank of Southern Africa, and the Presidency under Thabo Mbeki. Most recently, she was head of economic policy in the Department of Economic Development from 2010 until 2015, when she joined TIPS. Her primary economic interests are in

industrial policy An industrial policy (IP) or industrial strategy of a country is its official strategic effort to encourage the development and growth of all or part of the economy, often focused on all or part of the manufacturing sector. The government takes m ...

, value-chain analysis, and employment creation.

Early life and career

Makgetla was born in 1956 or 1957 in the United States, though she was later

naturalised Naturalization (or naturalisation) is the legal act or process by which a non-citizen of a country may acquire citizenship or nationality of that country. It may be done automatically by a statute, i.e., without any effort on the part of the in ...

as a South African citizen. She is Jewish. Her parents – legal scholar Robert B. Seidman and dependency theorist and economist

Ann Seidman Ann Willcox Seidman (30 April 1926 – 13 August 2019) was an American economist, active in African liberation struggles, and a writer and university professor. Background Ann Willcox Seidman was raised in New York city - her parents were enginee ...

– were American academics who taught at several African universities. In 1973, she had her first encounter with the African National Congress (ANC) in Lusaka, Zambia. She became a secretary in the party's Lusaka office, working alongside

Limpho Hani Limpho Hani (; born 31 January 1948) is a Mosotho–South African activist who is the widow of anti-apartheid activist Chris Hani. After her husband was assassinated in 1993, she had her own brief political career in the post-apartheid governm ...

and Jackie Molefe. Returning to the United States, Makgetla completed graduated with honours with a bachelor's degree from Harvard University in 1978. She undertook postgraduate studies in economics at the Hochschule für Ökonomie in

East Berlin East Berlin was the ''de facto'' capital city of East Germany from 1949 to 1990. Formally, it was the Allied occupation zones in Germany, Soviet sector of Berlin, established in 1945. The American, British, and French sectors were known as ...

, where she completed a master's in 1980 and a PhD in 1982. After that, she spent a decade in academia, initially at the

University of Zambia The University of Zambia (UNZA) is a public university located in Lusaka, Zambia. It is Zambia's largest and oldest learning institution. The university was established in 1965 and officially opened to the public on 12 July 1966. The language of ...

from 1983 to 1986 and later at the University of Redlands and elsewhere. Her association with the ANC continued, and she worked for the party's economic policy department in Lusaka. During the

, she helped draft the

(RDP), which became the ANC's flagship economic and social policy after it entered government in

1994 File:1994 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The 1994 Winter Olympics are held in Lillehammer, Norway; The Kaiser Permanente building after the 1994 Northridge earthquake; A model of the MS Estonia, which Sinking of the MS Estonia, sank in ...

. In the same period, she worked for the National Labour and Economic Development Institute (Naledi), a labour-aligned think tank.

Post-apartheid career

Civil service

Under the ANC government from 1994, Makgetla worked in the RDP office, led by RDP Minister Jay Naidoo. Makgetla was chief director for fiscal policy in the office, where, according to Patrick Bond, she was the leader of Naidoo's "

progressive Progressive may refer to: Politics * Progressivism, a political philosophy in support of social reform ** Progressivism in the United States, the political philosophy in the American context * Progressive realism, an American foreign policy par ...

flank" in subsequent disputes about the detail and implementation of the RDP. After the RDP office was disbanded in March 1996, Makgetla briefly served as director of research in the Department of Labour. In 1997, she joined the

as deputy director-general for remuneration. In that capacity, she was chief negotiator for the state in public-sector

wage bargaining Collective bargaining is a process of negotiation between employers and a group of employees aimed at agreements to regulate working salaries, working conditions, benefits, and other aspects of workers' compensation and rights for workers. The i ...

. According to Makgetla, her position in the department become uncomfortable after Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi was appointed as Minister of Public Service and Administration in 1999: while Fraser-Moleketi appeared to have a mandate to "get tough" on the public-sector unions in order to reduce the public wage bill, Makgetla's critics said that she was "soft on labour", both in wage talks and on the matter of public-sector retrenchments, with some going so far as to accuse her of being a union " mole". Makgetla was replaced as chief negotiator later in 1999, during wage negotiations that ultimately led to a unilateral wage award and a strike.

Cosatu policy unit

Makgetla left the civil service in 2000 and became coordinator for fiscal, monetary, and public-sector policy at the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), which was the largest labour federation in the country as well as the ANC's Tripartite Alliance partner. Now on the opposite side of public-sector wage negotiations, she criticised the government for "subordinating labour relations to a declining budget" and for falling victim to the "ideology of a contracting state and managerialism". Amid deteriorating relations between Cosatu and the ANC government under President Thabo Mbeki, Makgetla was a prominent face of the union's attack on Mbeki's Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR) programme, which had replaced the RDP; in 2001, she compared GEAR to a self-imposed structural adjustment programme and said that it was creating a "deep structural crisis", cutting

social services Social services are a range of public services intended to provide support and assistance towards particular groups, which commonly include the disadvantaged. They may be provided by individuals, private and independent organisations, or administe ...

while failing to create

employment Employment is a relationship between two parties regulating the provision of paid labour services. Usually based on a contract, one party, the employer, which might be a corporation, a not-for-profit organization, a co-operative, or any othe ...

. She was also strongly associated with Cosatu's anti-

privatisation Privatization (also privatisation in British English) can mean several different things, most commonly referring to moving something from the public sector into the private sector. It is also sometimes used as a synonym for deregulation when ...

campaign, with Minister of Public Enterprises Jeff Radebe reportedly identifying her as a key ideologue (though Radebe denied this). Some observers linked criticism of Makgetla to broader tensions about the putatively outsized influence of non-Africans and leftists in the Tripartite Alliance; the South African Democratic Teachers' Union, for example, said that the personalised focus on Makgetla was "racist".

Return to civil service

In 2006, Makgetla announced her impending departure from Cosatu, amid a broader exodus from the union that was perceived to be linked to Cosatu's support for corruption- and rape-accused presidential candidate

Jacob Zuma Jacob Gedleyihlekisa Zuma (; born 12 April 1942) is a South African politician who served as the fourth president of South Africa from 2009 to 2018. He is also referred to by his initials JZ and clan name Msholozi, and was a former anti-aparth ...

. Although Makgetla initially said that she was leaving Cosatu to return to Naledi, it was announced later in 2006 that she had been appointed to a position in Mbeki's kitchen cabinet. In 2007, she joined the Presidency as chief director for sector strategies, and she served simultaneously as a special economic adviser to Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka.

Richard Calland Richard J. T. Calland (born 10 July, 1964) is a British-South African writer and political analyst. Calland is Associate Professor of Public Law at the University of Cape Town and a Fellow of the Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership. ...

said that her appointment was somewhat surprising as "she had previously been shunned for fear that she was too

left wing Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...

". After leaving the Presidency, Makgetla joined the Development Bank of Southern Africa, first as lead economist for research and information and then as lead economist for development planning and implementation. While in that role, in March 2010, she was appointed to the economic development advisory panel established by

Ebrahim Patel Ebrahim Patel (born 1962 in District Six in Cape Town) is a South African cabinet minister, who holds the position of Minister of Trade and Industry (South Africa), Minister of Trade, Industry and Competition. He previously served as Minister ...

to advise his Ministry of Economic Development on job creation, economic trends, and development matters. Later the same year, she left the Development Bank to accept a full-time position in Patel's department as deputy director-general for economic policy, a position which she held until 2015. Patel also appointed her to the panel he established to advise government on Walmart's major Massmart acquisition.

Independent research

In November 2015, Makgetla joined Trade & Industrial Policy Strategies (TIPS) as a senior economist. She managed the think tank's trade and industry programme. While at TIPS, she was involved in a number of high-profile policy initiatives. In 2018, Finance Minister

Nhlanhla Nene Nhlanhla Musa Nene ( tɬantɬa born 5 December 1958) served as the Minister of Finance of South Africa under President Jacob Zuma from 25 May 2014 until his controversial removal on 9 December 2015, and under President Cyril Ramaphosa from 27 Fe ...

appointed her to his nine-member VAT review panel, chaired by Ingrid Woolard and tasked with investigating options for making VAT in South Africa more

. The following year, she was appointed to the inaugural National Minimum Wage Commission, although the '' Business Day'' reported that organised business had opposed her appointment due to her former links to Cosatu. In October 2019, she was one of four individuals co-opted onto the ANC National Executive Committee, the party's top executive organ; she was a member until the committee's term ended in December 2022.

Personal life

Makgetla married Sophonia "Zeph" Makgetla in 1977. They had met and fallen in love while she was in Lusaka on her gap year; he was an Umkhonto we Sizwe operative in exile and was appointed as an

ambassador An ambassador is an official envoy, especially a high-ranking diplomat who represents a state and is usually accredited to another sovereign state or to an international organization as the resident representative of their own government or sov ...

after the end of apartheid. They have two daughters: Tumi, who is a political scientist, and Anita, who is in advertising.

References

External links

Neva Makgetla
at TIPS * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Makgetla, Neva Living people 1950s births Naturalised citizens of South Africa 20th-century South African economists 21st-century South African economists 20th-century American economists 21st-century American economists South African women economists American women economists South African trade unionists Members of the African National Congress Harvard University alumni Academic staff of the University of Zambia University of Redlands faculty American emigrants to South Africa