Sapa-AFP

Xolile Blessing Bam is passionate about computers. The 20-year-old studied IT at a business college in Joburg, but he has not been able to find a job since.

To get experience and keep busy, he volunteers as a teaching assistant at a Soweto school.

“I’ve tried looking for a job for a year-and-a-half now,” Bam said. “The challenges are experience and the level of education, because I only have a certificate, not a diploma or degree.”

Bam’s story is typical. Out of a population of 49 million, 7.5m South Africans are out of work. Young people are worst affected, with over half of 18 to 25-year-olds unemployed.

According to Cosatu, there’s no other middle-income country in the world with such a high rate of unemployment. “We call it a ticking bomb,” says Zwelinzima Vavi, Cosatu’s general secretary. “We think one day there may be an explosion. Seventy-three percent of people who are unemployed in SA are below the age of 35 and a lot have been to university.

“If we look at lots of our cities, they are all surrounded by a ring of fire. We have seen in almost every direction around Joburg, periodic violent protest actions led by young people and women, the two sections of the community that bear the brunt of that crisis of unemployment.”

Demonstrations have exploded in poor areas, with the number of protests rising eight-fold in the last seven years, peaking at 111 in 2010. Last October, more than 2 000 young people marched in Joburg to demand jobs, led by ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema, who has made “economic freedom” his rallying cry.

Now, some observers warn that SA could see its own “Arab Spring”. “When those people stand up, they are not going to be as peaceful as we hope when they try and voice their grievances,” said Kindiza Ubami, from Joburg’s Centre for Violence and Reconciliation. “It will be as bad as in the Arab countries.”

In an attempt to pacify this growing anger, President Jacob Zuma has promised to create 5m jobs by 2020. In his recent State of the Nation address, he put forward an ambitious job-creation plan, underpinned by R300 billion to upgrade the nation’s railways and ports.

SA’s economy has begun creating jobs again, with unemployment at 23.9 percent in the last quarter of 2011 – still very high, but the lowest level since the 2008 global financial crisis.

But SA still has not replaced the 1m jobs lost during the global recession and the part of the population living in poverty, at nearly 40 percent, has hardly budged since the advent of ANC rule.

“The work done last year indicates that if we continue to grow reasonably well, we will begin to write a new story about SA – the story of how, working together, we drove back unemployment and reduced economic inequality and poverty,” Zuma said.

The job creation drive might seem a long way off but politicians trust and hope it is enough to give young people hope.

Despite the increase in protests, many young people do not want revolution. Bam, for one, just wants to earn a living. “I actually believe in myself and the skills I have. So if anyone says ‘hey, I can try you out for two days’, I’ll be there and make sure that person is impressed.”