Monday March 18, 2024

The National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union [NEHAWU] joins millions of social workers around the world in celebrating World Social Work Day, which is celebrated annually on the third Tuesday of March.

As NEHAWU, we salute the courageous and compassionate agents of social change who play a tremendous role in providing social services to humanity. We appreciate the role that social workers play in improving the socio conditions of our people. We recognise their invaluable contribution in social transformation and development.

This year, the World Social Work Day is celebrated under the theme “Shared Future for Transformative Change”. Indeed, this theme emphasizes the importance of social workers as agents of social transformation and development and thus calls upon social workers to adopt innovative, community-led approaches for a transformative change of our society.

As NEHAWU, we recognise the array of social challenges faced by our communities which necessitate a holistic and inclusive approach in addressing them for an envisaged shared future. In this regard, it is important to have a collaborative pursuit that transcends existing norms. This will enable us to deal societal challenges such as poverty, inequality and Gender-Based Violence against women and children amongst others. These challenges demand a comprehensive response, and social workers are poised to play a central role in fostering transformative change across a spectrum of societal concerns.

As we celebrate this day, it is imperative for government to invest in social workers and put more resources to address challenges encountering our social services system. This investment would contribute in improving and strengthening the provision of quality social services to the nation. The National Development Plan 2030 attest to the urgent need to invest in social workers to be able to meet the target plan of employing close to 55 000 social service professionals to respond to the country’s social welfare needs.

Lastly, we reaffirm our commitment to wage a relentless struggle for social workers. The national union salutes social workers for their excellent contribution as agents of social transformation and development.

END

Issued by NEHAWU Secretariat

Zola Saphetha (General Secretary) at 082 558 5968; December Mavuso (Deputy General Secretary) at 082 558 5969; Lwazi Nkolonzi (NEHAWU National Spokesperson) at 081 558 2335 or email: lwazin@nehawu.org.za