Execs take their chances overseas

[Vox Populi Vox Dei]

Advertising executive Penny Holt loves her native South Africa but power cuts, a murky political climate and widespread violent crime made her think about leaving the nation she once viewed as a beacon of hope.

A robbery at her office was the last straw.

"There's a brutality, an anger that worries me," said the 32-year-old executive at Saatchi & Saatchi as she finished packing up her house in the well-heeled northern suburbs of Johannesburg ready to move to London, England.

Holt's decision reflects what appears to be an accelerating trend in Africa's biggest economy. Professionals, often young and in middle management but increasingly senior executives too, are leaving, adding to a skills shortage that is already acute.

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The Homecoming Revolution, a group which tries to persuade South Africans living abroad to move home, said it has seen an increase in people wanting to return this year.

Managing director Martine Schaffer said of the 1 000 South Africans who attended the group's exhibition in London this month, four out of five were planning to return to South Africa.

It's amazing how they (Homecoming Revolution) never provide actual statistics.

 

[mac_mac74]

yeah and some economists are even saying this economic meltdown will create job losses and the SAfricans who loose jobs will come back home.

If i were them, im not sure i would be so desperate to come back to SA

 

[Hosehead]

Thing is about these Homecoming Revolution shindigs is you can run around the exhibition hall three or four times blindfolded before you run into yourself.

 

[Vrotappel]

Just the fact that a country needs a group calling itself "Homecoming Revolution" shows the crap it is in.