This year has seen a series of mishaps in the textile and manufacturing sector.
We have seen factories closing down due to unfavourable market conditions abroad, thousands of Basotho jobless.
As if that is not bad enough, we witnessed another unsavoury incident: a factory at Maputsoe closed shop over the weekend without notifying its workers who have been left stranded. The sad thing is the owners of the company, who are based in South Africa, are said to have did a runner and are nowhere to be found.
This does not augur well for the country whose unemployment rate is estimated at 23.74 percent in 2023. This means unemployed people in Lesotho are estimated at 430 000 in 2023.
On the other hand, the employment rate in Lesotho was at the beginning of this year forecasted to be 57.14 percent in 2023.
Lesotho’s unemployment, poverty and income inequality and other social ills remain pervasive in the face of non-inclusive growth.
Not only is what Afrikaner-owned Ace Apparel (Pvt) Ltd did a breach of acceptable labour practices, but it also borders on criminality.
We agree with those who believe that the country’s investment promotion agency, the Lesotho National Development Corporation, needs to revisit the way it does business with these foreign investors.
LNDC should tighten conditions of trading in Lesotho by making sure investors have collateral security, should they decide to disappear or pull a fast one like we have just witnessed in Maputsoe.
