Taking COSATU Today Forward Special Bulletin, 29 January 2026 #Back2SchoolCampaign #Right2LearnCampaign
Norman Mampane
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COSATU TODAY #Back2SchoolCampaign #Cosatu40 #SACTU70 #ClassStruggle “Build Working Class Unity for Economic Liberation towards Socialism” #Back2Basics #JoinCOSATUNow #ClassConsciousness |
Taking COSATU Today Forward Special Bulletin
‘Whoever sides with the revolutionary people in deed as well as in word is a revolutionary in the full sense’-Maoo
Our side of the story
29 January 2026
“Build Working Class Unity for Economic Liberation towards Socialism”
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Contents
- Workers Parliament: Back to Basics!
- Employment and Labour’s UIF to host Compliance Seminars in Pietermaritzburg
- South Africa
- COSATU is extremely disappointed that the SARB failed to cut the repo rate to provide breathing space to workers
- SACP Special Central Committee Statement
- International-Workers’ Solidarity!
- Employment injury insurance in Bangladesh: the vital role of social protection
Workers’ Parliament-Back2Basics
Employment and Labour’s UIF to host Compliance Seminars in Pietermaritzburg
22 January 2026
The Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF), an entity of the Department of Employment and Labour, invites members of the media to attend Compliance Seminars to be held in Pietermaritzburg, KwaZulu-Natal, on 5 and 6 February 2026.
The seminars form part of the UIF's ongoing efforts to strengthen compliance, enhance regulatory awareness, and improve service delivery to businesses and workers across South Africa. The engagements will bring together UIF officials, employers, industry representatives, payroll administrators, and HR practitioners.
Key focus areas will include updates and practical guidance on the Unemployment Insurance Act, Labour Activation Programme, Compensation Fund, Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA), Inspection and Enforcement Services, and Productivity SA.
Journalists attending the seminars will have an opportunity to engage with UIF leadership and gain insight into the Fund's strategic initiatives to strengthen employer support and expand social protection coverage.
The activities are scheduled to take place as follows:
Date: 5 February 2026 (UIF Compliance Seminar with Organised Labour and Employees)
Venue: Golden Horse Hotel & Casino
Time: 09:00 – 13:00
Date: 6 February 2026 (UIF Compliance Seminar with Employers and Industry Representatives)
Venue: Golden Horse Hotel & Casino
Time: 09:00 – 13:00
Media RSVP: Journalists wishing to cover the Compliance Seminars are requested to RSVP by close of business on Tuesday, 01 February 2026 to Email: azwiitw...@labour.gov.za
For media inquiries, please contact:
Petunia Lessing
Director: Media Liaison
066 301 4645/ petunia...@labour.gov.za
For media enquiries, please contact:
Teboho Thejane
Departmental Spokesperson
082 697 0694/ teboho....@labour.gov.za
-ENDS-
Issued by: Department of Employment and Labour
COSATU is extremely disappointed that the SARB failed to cut the repo rate to provide breathing space to workers
Matthew Parks, COSATU Parliamentary Coordinator, 29 January 2026
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) is deeply disappointed that the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) failed to cut the repo rate to provide badly needed breathing space to millions of workers struggling to cope with the rising costs of living. This was an unnecessary missed opportunity to give workers and the economy badly needed relief.
The SARB needs to seize the opportunity of an inflation rate that has been consistently falling and at 3.5% is well within the inflation target range and utilise its March Monetary Policy Committee meeting to slash the repo rate by at least 50 basis points.
Workers are barely surviving with electricity and fuel price hikes far above inflation. Their wages have not kept pace with these increases. Workers are supporting relatives who cannot find jobs in an economy stumbling along an average 1% annual growth and with a 42.4% unemployment rate with deeply alarming numbers of jobs being shed by various companies. The National Credit Regulator’s debt reports shine a deeply worrying spotlight on workers’ dangerously high levels of indebtedness.
The two years of repo rate hikes in response to the war in Ukraine and the subsequent spike in international oil prices inflicted real damage on the South African economy and workers have been made to pay the price with an abnormally high repo rate, making servicing debt even more difficult and denying a struggling economy critical stimulus.
A bold and progressive repo rate cut in March will ease workers’ debt burdens, help them to take care of their families and pay their debts, and inject badly needed stimulus into an economy suffocating from high lending rates.
The Federation hopes the SARB will not once again disappoint workers when it meets in March. It needs to act on the side of workers and provide badly needed comfort for a nation that has seen its share of negative headwinds.
COSATU will continue to engage with and push the SARB on this burning matter for the working class and the economy.
Issued by COSATU
______________________
SACP Special Central Committee Statement
Mbulelo Mandlana, SACP Head of Media, Communications and Information, 29 January 2026
On 23 January 2026, the South African Communist Party (SACP) held a Special Central Committee meeting in Braamfontein, Johannesburg. The meeting addressed the organisation’s overall state and specifically the state of the Moses Mabhida province of the SACP (KwaZulu Natal).
Having received a detailed report on the operations of the organisation in Moses Mabhida province and after an in-depth discussion on the report, the Central Committee resolved to confirm the decision of the SACP Politburo of 31 October 2025 to disband the Provincial Executive Committee of Moses Mabhida and establish a provincial interim leadership core.
To that end, the Special Central Committee has finalised the decision relating to the status of the erstwhile leadership structure of Moses Mabhida as that of a disbanded structure replaced by an interim leadership core whose mandate is to organise a provincial congress where a new provincial executive committee will be elected. The Special Central Committee adopted a draft plan aimed towards reviving the organisation in Moses Mabhida.
ISSUED
BY THE SOUTH AFRICAN COMMUNIST PARTY,
FOUNDED IN 1921 AS THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF SOUTH AFRICA.
Media, Communications & Information Department | MCID
International-Solidarity
Employment injury insurance in Bangladesh: the vital role of social protection
28 January, 2026
Social protection is an internationally recognized human right. It is enshrined in instruments like ILO Convention 102 on Social Security and ILO Convention 168 on Employment Promotion and Protection against Unemployment, and it encompasses elements such as unemployment and employment injury insurance, old-age and maternity benefits and sick pay.
Providing social protection is a state duty, but because it is an internationally recognized right, it is also part of the corporate responsibility to respect, according to the UN Guiding Principles on Business & Human Rights.
It is also in companies’ interests to ensure workers producing their goods and services have adequate social protection. This is because, as the ILO notes, social protection or social security is “defined as the set of policies and programmes designed to reduce and prevent poverty and vulnerability throughout the life cycle.” In other words, it is essential not only in human rights terms but also in terms of resilient societies and stable supply chains.
The Employment Insurance Scheme (EIS) pilot in Bangladesh is the first national employment injury insurance programme for the country’s four million ready-made garment (RMG) workers, providing payouts for life to injured workers and the families of deceased workers. The fund is administered by the government, but it receives voluntary top-up payments from over 90 global brands and retailers representing about 50 per cent of the total value of RMG export orders from the country. The EIS is a successful example of multistakeholder participation in a public programme.
On 27 January, IndustriALL co-hosted, along with the Committee on Workers’ Capital, the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility and the Labour Rights Investor Network, with the technical assistance of the ILO, a virtual investor meeting on the EIS. The event was part of a series of webinars and meetings IndustriALL has organized since 2022 to increase investor awareness of the importance of social protection and investors’ role in strengthening initiatives such as the EIS.
The audience included pension funds, faith-based investors and large asset managers, and speakers included the ILO, global brands and a Swiss investor. Via video, a senior official of the Bangladesh Ministry of Labour and Employment spoke of the government’s commitment to putting in place a national scheme to institutionalise the EIS.
Representatives of H&M, Primark and PVH spoke about why they were signatories to the EIS, noting that the pilot has proven its value, with proper governance, a reliable claims process and a predictable financial flow. A lively exchange with the audience rounded out the meeting.
“Without the EIS, we’d be back to square one, with individual systems for each brand to address injuries one by one.”
H&M
“The EIS is a perfect example of what ‘good’ looks like.”
Primark
At a time when regulations meant to strengthen corporate human rights due diligence in supply chains are being attacked or weakened, investors are an increasingly important guardrail in holding companies to account for their impacts on human rights. Many large investors are “universal owners”, meaning they hold assets across the entire economy and are therefore affected by systemic risks.
Poor social protection not only affects individual workers; it creates societal risk that carries implications for productivity and supply chain stability. Making these connections clear to investors is one way to build support for crucial initiatives such as the EIS, which is showing the way towards responsible sourcing and effective social protection for workers.
Said Christina Hajagos-Clausen, IndustriALL textile and garment director:
"The EIS pilot successfully demonstrates shared responsibility – across the government, brands, employers, trade unions and investors. And it’s in investors’ interests for workers in their companies’ supply chains to receive fair remedy for injuries they incur while producing for those companies."
______________________________
Norman Mampane (Shopsteward Editor)
Congress of South African Trade Unions
110 Jorissen Cnr Simmonds Street, Braamfontein, 2017
P.O.Box 1019, Johannesburg, 2000, South Africa
Tel: +27 11 339-4911 Direct line: 010 219-1348