Taking COSATU Today Forward, 10 June 2022
Norman Mampane
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#2022YearofWorkersParliament #COSATU holds a National Campaigns and Organizing Coordination Committee session with all affiliated trade unions #YouthMonth #InternalDemocracy #WorkerControl #EndChildLabour #Back2Basics #JoinCOSATUNow #ClassConsciousness |
Taking COSATU Today Forward
‘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
Thursday, 9 June 2022
‘Deepen
the Back to Basics Campaign, Consolidate the Struggle for the NDR and Advance the Struggle for Socialism’
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Contents
- Workers Parliament: Back to Basics!
- COSATU discourages its members from participating in an unprotected national shutdown today
- South Africa
- COSATU discourages its members from participating in an unprotected national shutdown tomorrow
- International-Workers’ Solidarity!
- WFTU Solidarity Statement with the farmers in Colombia
- Tunisia: Government’s dismissal of judges an affront to fundamental rights and the rule of law
- ILO Workers’ Group statement on Ukraine: Peace, social justice, solidarity
Workers’ Parliament-Back2Basics
COSATU discourages its members from participating in an unprotected national shutdown today
Sizwe Pamla, Cosatu National Spokesperson, 09 June 2021
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) has noted reports about a possible National Shutdown planed for tomorrow, 10 June 2022. These reports have mentioned COSATU as one of the participants of this stay away.
The Federation and its affiliated unions will not be part of that stay way. We also discourage our members from joining this stayaway because it is an unprotected action that can result in their dismissal from work. For any protected strike to take place, a Section 77 certificate needs to be applied for and issued by Nedlac as per the Labour Relations Act.
COSATU is not aware of a shutdown, nor has it been engaged to support it, neither have workers or unions mandated it to participate in one.
The Federation is busy trying to use dialogue to ensure that government take steps to stem the tide of unaffordable rise in fuel prices. These increases are bleeding workers’ meagre wages, making it difficult for businesses to hire workers and suffocating the economy.
We need government to extend the fuel price tax relief it has provided beyond July; it also needs to provide a more affordable tax regime for fuel.
There is an urgent need to deregulate the fuel price to allow competition, and the re-submission of the RAF and RABS Bills at Parliament to place the RAF on a more sustainable financial path and lessen the need for it be bailed out through fuel levy hikes.
Government needs to act swiftly to reopen all Metrorail lines to help 10 million commuters, and to ensure all Transnet freight lines are fully operational.
The fragmentation of transport services in the country continues to undermine access to affordable, safe and reliable public transport. The public transport system should be well coordinated and integrated. In our view, this is crucial for enhancing local economic development and eliminating the apartheid spatial challenges.
The government needs to invest more in public transport, and to begin plans to move cars and other vehicles from fuel to electric and hydro.
These are critical to lessening South Africa’s dependency on imported fuel and exposure to volatile international oil prices.
Issued by COSATU.
South Africa
COSATU Gauteng wishes the SACP a successful Provincial Congress
Louisa Modikwe, COSATU Gauteng Provincial Secretary, 10 June 2022
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) in Gauteng wishes the South African Communist Party (SACP) in Gauteng a fruitful and successful congress, which will be convened from 11-12 June 2022.
This congress is taking place at a time when the working class is confronted by difficult socio-economic challenges which include poor service delivery, unemployment, poverty, widened inequalities, corruption and lawlessness amongst others.
In an added effort to address these challenges, our government is implementing neo-liberal austerity measures which will target the reduction of the budget on health, education, safety and security, salaries of public servants just to mention a few, in the same way that corporate tax was reduced for the benefit of business.
The political situation in the alliance has deteriorated.
Political education is non-existent and the working class continues to bear the brunt of high costs while leaders look on.
We’ve noticed the mushrooming of opportunistic organisations who are taking advantage of this situation and using it to advance their own agenda.
It is for these reasons that the 14 Provincial Congress of COSATU held in February 2022 resolved to build and strengthen the SACP.
COSATU in Gauteng therefore calls on the SACP through its provincial congress to strengthen its resolutions which are directed at building the left popular front, building a mass party entrenched in working class areas and working with COSATU to fight the current challenges facing the working class.
Issued by COSATU Gauteng.
International-Solidarity
WFTU Solidarity Statement with the farmers in Colombia
9 June 2022
The World Federation of Trade Unions expresses its full and unconditional solidarity and support with the farmers in Colombia who are facing repression and death threats to stop their collective struggle.
These practices aim to silence all those who struggle for better working conditions, adequate salaries, and dignified living conditions. We are standing on the side of the farmers of Colombia. These practices will fail. The international class-oriented trade union movement strongly and unequivocally condemns the threats, blackmails, prosecutions, attacks, murders, and other crimes by paramilitary groups.
We demand in the strongest terms the government of Colombia to immediately implement all the necessary measures to protect the life of all trade unions and activists and to ensure the full respect of all political, democratic, and trade union rights and freedoms.
http://www.wftucentral.org/wftu-solidarity-statement.../
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Tunisia: Government’s dismissal of judges an affront to fundamental rights and the rule of law via AFP
7 June 2022
In a new threat to freedom and the rule of law in Tunisia, the government has unilaterally dismissed 57 judges.
The sackings ignore the frameworks regulating the work of the judiciary and its representative bodies and deprive the judges of the right to object to, and take legal action against, their dismissal.
The unions of the country’s judges have launched strike action in protest at the government’s move, and the ITUC-affiliated UGTT has called a public sector strike for 16 June.
The dismissals follow a series of orders and decrees restricting fundamental rights and freedoms in Tunisia, such as Circular No. 2, which forbids any negotiations with unions without the permission of the prime minister. This contravenes ILO Convention 98, which guarantees the right to collective bargaining.
ITUC General Secretary Sharan Burrow said: “This wholesale dismissal of judges without any due process, and depriving them of any right to appeal, is the latest step in the tightening of the executive’s control over the judiciary after the seizure of legislative power.
“We fully support the judges’ strike and protests against this arbitrary dismissal, as well as all those who stand in solidarity with them and against attempts to control and manipulate the judiciary. We call on all concerned to support the UGTT’s endeavours to launch a serious national dialogue that ends the political, economic and social crisis in the country."
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ILO Workers’ Group statement on Ukraine: Peace, social justice, solidarity
8 June 2022
Delegates and representatives of trade unions from ILO Member States gathered in the Workers’ Group at the International Labour Conference in Geneva in June 2022:
· recall that the constitution of the International Labour Organisation states that lasting peace can only be achieved on the basis of social justice, reaffirm their belief that there can also be no social justice without peace, and insist that common security should be at the heart of the United Nation’s mission;
· reassert the importance of ILO Recommendation 205 on Employment and Decent Work for Peace and Resilience adopted in 2017;
· recognise the many armed conflicts raging in the world, some of them protracted, and all of them with devastating consequences for working people, their families and communities, and express full solidarity with all workers and unions around the world, affected by such conflicts;
· pay special tribute to the workers and unions of Ukraine, who are contributing to the struggle against the Russian aggression and for a free, sovereign and democratic Ukraine, and express admiration for their efforts to support internally displaced persons;
· praise workers in neighbouring countries and around the world contributing through their unions to provide accommodation and ensure decent work, access to education and care for children and families;
· express strong concern about the economic impact of the war on workers’ livelihoods around the globe, in the form of food and fuel shortages and price rises, which will require concerted international action to prevent a dramatic increase in poverty and starvation;
· express particular concern about the impact of armed conflict on women and girls including through sexual violence and harassment, and raise the alarm about their vulnerability as refugees, which demands effective protection measures;
· call on governments around the world to work together towards an unconditional withdrawal of Russian military forces from the territory of Ukraine, and to promote the ideals of common security, starting with an immediate ceasefire; and
· urge the international community to start already now preparing to help rebuild Ukraine’s economy, infrastructure and institutions, with a key role for the ILO and trade unions in ensuring that social dialogue, decent work and rights for workers are central to that reconstruction, as well as underlining the fundamental importance of women’s active participation in all peace processes to ensure their success.
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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