Taking COSATU Today Forward, 7 October 2021 #ThankYouWorkers
Norman Mampane
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#2021YearofCosatuLocals #Back2Basics #Cosatu acknowledges all workers who participate in the National Socio-Economic Strike across more than 28 major cities and towns in nine provinces #CosatuNationalMarch2021 |
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, 7 October 2021
‘Deepen
the Back to Basics Campaign, Consolidate the Struggle for the NDR and Advance the Struggle for Socialism’
All workers urged to take Covid19 vaccine jabs!
Organize at every workplace and demand Personal Protective Equipment Now!
Defend Jobs Now!
Join COSATU NOW!
Contents
- Workers Parliament: Back to Basics!
Ø Minister Thulas Nxesi calls for calm in the face of increasing industrial action
- South Africa
- NEHAWU supports the COSATU Socio-Economic National Strike
Ø Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane gazettes National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Bill, 2021
- International-Workers’ Solidarity!
- ITUC-Africa Statement on the Occasion of World Day for Decent Work 2021: Putting decent work at the heart of Africa’s social and economic development policies
- A more ambitious financing strategy to enable the world to build back more inclusively and sustainably is feasible, says a new ILO paper
Workers’ Parliament-Back2Basics
Minister Thulas Nxesi calls for calm in the face of increasing industrial action
7 Oct 2021
Minister Nxesi calls for calm in the face of increasing industrial action
Employment and Labour Minister T.W Nxesi urges all parties to resolve their industrial issues urgently through social dialogue especially in this sensitive period of massive unemployment and retrenchments.
The Minister was speaking as one of the major employer organisation the Steel and Engineering Industries Federation of South Africa (Seifsa) and the largest worker organisation, the National Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) are held in a deadlock over pay following the end of their wage agreement in June.
Added to that, one of the country’s biggest federations having called for workers to come out in their millions this week for protest action.
Nxesi appealed to all social partners entering the wage negotiations to work through their issues on the table. He said hostility would not solve differences, instead of risks escalating the severe economic and social damages that have been brought about by the Covid-19.
“Our Constitution guarantees the right of association and the protection of worker rights and industrial action. We respect the fact that many people died for us to be able to enjoy these rights. But with the rights come to the responsibilities and we would like to urge unions and other worker representatives to exercise this responsibility.
“It is common cause that the country is now going through one of the most difficult periods occasioned by the pandemic on one hand and the inclement economic conditions that prevailed even before Covid-19 on the other. It is against this background that we appeal to all the players – workers and employers, unions federations and employer bodies to handle the sensitive talks with the necessary caution.
“Cool heads should prevail and the good of the country and our economy should always at the top of mind. After protracted industrial action, we still have to come and sit around the table to resolve our differences but it is not wise or advisable to play a zero-sum game. We are all invested in this country, said Minister Nxesi.
This comes in the wake of the latest unemployment figures from Statistics South Africa which shows that the country has lost even more jobs in the second quarter with some 54 000 people losing their jobs in the second quarter of 2021 to 14,9 million. The number of unemployed persons increased by 584 000 to 7,8 million compared to the first quarter of 2021.
The report also showed that discouraged work-seekers increased by 186 000 (5,9%) and these and other changes resulted in the official unemployment rate increasing by 1,8 percentage points from 32,6% in the first quarter of 2021 to 34,4% in the second quarter of 2021 - the highest since the start of the QLFS in 2008, according to StatsSA.
Minister Nxesi said it would be tragic if more people become unemployed when social dialogue would be more fruitful.
Media
enquiries:
Sabelo Mali: MLO
0827295804 or Sabel...@labour.gov.za(link
sends e-mail) or
Musa
Zondi
Acting National Spokesperson
067 426 4190 or Musa....@labour.gov.za(link
sends e-mail)
Issued by: Department of Employment and Labour
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South Africa
NEHAWU supports the COSATU Socio-Economic National Strike
Zola Saphetha, NEHAWU General Secretary, October 06, 2021
The National Education Health and Allied Workers’ Union [NEHAWU] supports the socio-economic national strike of our federation, the Congress of South African Trade Unions [COSATU] set to take place on Thursday, 07th October 2021.
This socio-economic national strike is convened against the background of a total onslaught directed at workers and collective bargaining by the government through national treasury policies that have prioritised implementing austerity measures including reducing public service wage bill, cuts in social spending, salary freezes, outsourcing, mass retrenchments, and freezing funded vacant posts amongst others.
As NEHAWU, we fully support the socio-economic national strike and make the following demands amongst others:
- Demand the protection of our Collective Bargaining Right
- An end to the implement of austerity measures
- Fill all vacant posts in the public service
- An end to the mass corruption in both the private and public sector.
- Implementation of the National Health Insurance
- Permanent absorption of Community Health Workers
Lastly, we call on all our members and workers in general to join and participate in this socio-economic strike by our federation.
This strike is a protected strike, meaning workers will not victimised for taking part in the strike and as such we call upon employers not to victimise workers for participating in the strike.
END
Issued by NEHAWU Secretariat
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Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane gazettes National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Bill, 2021
7 Oct 2021
Department gazettes National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Bill, 2021
The Minister of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities intends introducing the National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Bill 2021 (NCGBVF Bill), to Parliament within the current financial year. The Bill will set the legal framework for the establishment of the National Council on GBVF which will coordinate the country’s response to the scourge of gender-based violence and femicide.
The Bill seeks to establish a multi-sectoral, independent and non-partisan advisory body, comprising of representatives from both government and civil society organisations to ensure effective coordination and implementation of the National Strategic Plan on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide.
This envisaged structure will be called: National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide; and shall be accountable to a Board. The National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Secretariat led by a Chief Executive Officer will provide technical and administrative support to the Council.
The Bill seeks:
· To establish the National Council on Gender-Based Violence and Femicide;
· To provide for the objects and functions of the Council;
· To appoint the Board of the Council; to provide for the appointment of members of the Board; to provide for the term of office of members of the Board; to provide for the termination of membership of the Board; to provide for meetings of the Board; to provide for the establishment of committees of the Board; to provide for the appointment of an Executive Officer and the Secretariat of the Council;
· To provide for the establishment of norms and standards for the provincial and local working groups; to provide for the making of regulations; and to provide for matters connected therewith.
Copies of the Bill can be obtained from Ms Nondumiso Ngqulunga, Director: Legal Services, Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities, 36 Hamilton Street, Arcadia, Pretoria, Cell: 076 7929 142 or Nondumiso...@women.gov.za(link sends e-mail)
Media enquires:
Mr Shalen Gajadhar (Director: Communications, Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities)
060 979 4235
For media engagements with Minister Maite Nkoana-Mashabane contact Ms Xolelwa Siya Dwesini on Xolelwa...@women.gov.za(link sends e-mail)
Issued by: Department of Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities
International-Solidarity
Share
The African Regional Organisation of the International Trade Union Confederation
(ITUC-Africa www.ituc-africa.org) strongly affirms that decent work sums up the
aspirations of people in their working lives. It involves opportunities for work that is
productive and delivers a fair income, security in the workplace and social protection for
families, better prospects for personal development and social integration, freedom for
people to express their concerns, organize and participate in the decisions that affect
their lives and equality of opportunity and treatment for all women and men.
With decent work, everyone wins – workers, businesses and the economy. Evidence
shows that decent work is the only sustainable way to accelerate the growth of
production and employment to increase the pace of poverty reduction and to build
genuine democracy and social cohesion.
The World Day for Decent Work is a day where workers, their unions and their
supporters around the world are mobilizing for decent jobs for all and respect for the
rights of workers. As African workers, we are joining the rest of the world today in
commemorating the World Day for Decent Work (WDDW) and we would like to
recognize the sacrifice of millions of workers who lost their lives in the COVID-19
pandemic due to the lack of decent working conditions at the time and inadequate
provision of necessary Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).
Before the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, almost half of the population in Africa
lived below the poverty line and more than 140 million people were low-income workers
who did not have the means to sustainably meet the needs of their families. These
situations have worsened and the hardship of workers and their families continues
The COVID-19 crisis has uncovered the huge decent work deficits that still prevail in 2021
In particular, the crisis highlights the vulnerability of millions of working
people
and the lack of social protection coverage. Women and informal economy workers are
more adversely exposed to the harsh and hard socio-economic effects that this global
health crisis has thrown up.
The ITUC-Africa wants to restate the need and urgency for the continent to consciously
and systematically work towards the development of a robust and inclusive social
As always, African organized labor resolves to continue to organize, mobilize
and take
collective action to ensure that our people are enjoying jobs that are -productive and
deliver on a fair income; secured and dignified; premised on social protection for
families; and based on better prospects for personal development and social
integration. Equally important is for such jobs and working conditions to be founded on
the principles of freedom for people to express their concerns, organize and participate
in the decisions that affect their lives; and expected to accord equal opportunities and
treatment to working women and men.
As ITUC-Africa, we will continue to work towards the promotion and attainment of the
decent work agenda through strategies and actions that will foster the involvement of
trade unions in national economic and social policies, combined with strong
autonomous social dialogue and effective collective bargaining arrangements.
Signed: Kwasi Adu-Amankwah
General Secretary
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A more ambitious financing strategy to enable the world to build back more inclusively and sustainably is feasible, says a new ILO paper
7 October 2021
Bolder use of the existing international financial architecture could accelerate worldwide COVID-19 recovery and climate action, including in low- and lower-middle-income countries, says a new ILO research paper.
GENEVA (ILO News) – Fuller utilization of the existing capital and tools
of the international financial institutions could more rapidly reduce the threats to humanity posed by the pandemic and climate change, says a new working paper of the International Labour Organization.
The paper Financing
Human-Centred COVID-19 Recovery and Decisive Climate Action Worldwide: International Cooperation’s 21st Century Moment of Truth ,
provides a concrete illustration of how the International
Monetary Fund (IMF) and multilateral development banks could mobilize a tripling of official development assistance-related external flows to developing countries over the next several years to reverse the growing disparity in pandemic response and recovery
between them and developed countries and to confront one of the biggest and most immediate obstacles to achievement of the Paris agreement’s goals: the burning of coal.
The paper argues that all nations have an interest in greatly accelerating implementation – including in low- and lower-middle-income countries – of the strategies that have been agreed internationally to address the universal threats posed by the pandemic
and climate change, i.e., WHO’s ACT-A/COVAX initiative; the ILO
Global Call to Action for a Human-Centred Recovery from the COVID-19 Crisis ;
and the 2030
Agenda ,
which includes the Paris
climate agreement objectives
and Sustainable Development Goals. The most feasible way the necessary resources can be mobilized is for these institutions to be deployed as imaginatively and expansively over the next several years as advanced countries have deployed their central banks
and treasuries since the beginning of the pandemic. The paper outlines a set of specific initiatives to this end, including but not limited to a structured framework for the donation of recently issued IMF Special Drawing Rights (SDRs), that would:
· fully and promptly fund the WHO ACT-A/COVAX Initiative;
· adequately resource debt relief and restructuring, social protection floors and job-rich, SDG-related sustainable infrastructure and industry in these developing countries; and
· finance a global effort to avoid a lock-in of greenhouse gas emissions from coal-fired power generation, which represents the single largest and most time sensitive aspect of the climate action and just transition required to achieve the goals of the Paris climate agreement.
“This working paper seeks to demonstrate that the international community already has at its disposal the lion’s share of the resources necessary to meet this moment and enhance the security of every person on the planet."
Richard Samans, ILO Research Department Director
This fuller and more networked utilization of the international financial
institutions to implement multilaterally agreed objectives would enable the world to shift from continued incremental to truly transformational progress on COVID-19 recovery
and climate change without relying on major increases in bilateral foreign aid budgets. It would increase ODA-related external flows over the next seven years by $2 trillion to 82 poorer developing countries, the equivalent of about 4 per cent of their GDP
per year during this period. This would exceed the scale of the Marshall Plan’s support of Europe’s efforts to “build back better” from World War II, while leveraging such increased external financing in a similar manner to improve domestic resource mobilization.
It would also fulfil the still unmet promise by advanced countries to mobilize at least $100 billion per year in climate finance to developing countries by 2020.
All of this would be possible if wealthier countries agreed to donate an average of 60 per cent of their new SDR allocation to low- and lower-middle-income countries and if Multilateral Development Bank boards agreed to utilize two-thirds of the estimated additional
room they collectively have in their capital structures to expand lending and blended finance activity without affecting their credit ratings.
The paper’s author, ILO
Research Department Director
Richard Samans, commented, “As the UN Secretary-General’s recent landmark report, Our
Common Agenda ,
suggests, this is a watershed moment for international
cooperation and the multilateral system. This working paper seeks to demonstrate that the international community already has at its disposal the lion’s share of the resources necessary to meet this moment and enhance the security of every person on the planet.”
__________________________
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