COSATU Today, 14 May 2012
Patrick Craven
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Our side of the story
Monday 14 May 2012
Contents
Ø Come in numbers to oppose DA
Ø March in support of 17 unfairly dismissed Royal Mnandi workers at Wits
Ø ABSA withdraws retrenchment letters
Ø Judge rules in SACTWU’s favour
Ø Eulogy at Comrade Sicelo Shiceka’s funeral
Ø Helen Zille must keep her promise and resign over illegal communications tender
Ø YCLSA calls for Zille to resign
Ø Last apartheid leader is unapologetic proponent of racist, fascist system that oppressed majority
Ø NEHAWU supports idea to establish a state-owned construction company
Ø YCL calls for action on Madonsela's W Cape corruption findings
Ø Joint statement by European communist and workers’ parties
Ø SWAYOCO supports 100% PUDEMO NEC latest position on SSN shenanegans
Ø SSN supports blockade of imports to Swaziland
Ø Walter Sisulu Century Symposiums
Ø Industrialisation and the green economy; experiences from Germany
Workers
Planned march to COSATU HQ by chief political representatives of white monopoly capital and apartheid apologists – the DA!
13th May 2012
The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) held an emergency bilateral meeting with the Progressive Youth Alliance (PYA), namely the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL), South African Students’ Congress (SASCO) and Young Communist League of South Africa (YCL) in Johannesburg on Thursday 10 May 2012. The meeting discussed the provocative and deceitful planned march to COSATU’s Head Quarters by the chief political representatives of white monopoly capital and apartheid apologists – the Democratic Alliance (DA).
The meeting took place after successful Free Education Campaign demonstrations across the country, led by class-conscious and militant vanguard of the student movement – the South African Students’ Congress (SASCO) and the three-month long and unresolved strike action by members of the Communication Workers Union (CWU) who are working at the SA Post Office.
The meeting was characterized by high levels of maturity, unity, robust and comradely engagements. The meeting laid a foundation to consolidate and deepen the historic ties between leading workers’ formations and the youth movement of our country under the banner of the PYA.
The meeting reaffirmed the Freedom Charter as the correct political programme of the ANC-led Alliance and the Mass Democratic Movement (MDM) as a whole.
The meeting agreed that we are living in a country that is engulfed by the triple crisis of unemployment, poverty and inequalities, mostly affecting the urban and rural working class youth of our country. The meeting acknowledged that the current high waves of unemployment, poverty and inequality are a manifestation of the neo-liberal economic policies fostered and entrenched in the state over the past 18 years of our democratic breakthrough.
The meeting acknowledged that white monopoly capital remains in power in South Africa today, despite the democratic breakthrough of 1994. We also agreed that political power is just a shell, when it is not accompanied by genuine economic emancipation.
Real political power therefore remains firmly in the hands of white monopoly capital, which owns the decisive means of production in our country. It is precisely this situation which continues to generate the centuries-old conditions of humiliation and the suppression of the talents of the vast majority of the people, who are Black and working class.
The meeting agreed to drive a campaign that mobilizes the workers, unemployed, youth, with the working class as the leading motive force, to campaign for the full implementation of the Freedom Charter by the ANC-led government. We also agreed to wage a struggle to defeat the revisionist tendency which seeks to emasculate the revolutionary content of the Freedom Charter.
The meeting agreed that youth unemployment constitutes a ticking time bomb, and requires a clear and decisive break from the failed neo-liberal economic policies.
We have noted the intention of the DA to march against COSATU. We welcome this class provocation and we will grab this opportunity to be frontal against white monopoly.
This DA march marks the beginnings of an open class warfare that will characterize the South African landscape. We also view this open class warfare as a reflection of the deepening class antagonisms in our society.
The march by the DA reflects the heightened confidence and arrogance of white monopoly capital, whose sole intention is to smash the hegemony of the working class, thereby weaken the ANC-led Alliance, and turn the mass of the unemployed against employed.
Spurred forward by the rapid accumulation of wealth and the protection it receives from the neo-liberal collaborators within our ranks, white monopoly capital is now ready to openly and frontally attack the most revolutionary class within the national liberation movement.
We are clear that this march by the DA is not for the unemployed youths, it is a celebration of what it perceives as its victory over the popular forces of democracy in South Africa since 1994 and it is thus for the capitalists class to continue its accumulation by depressing workers’ wages and conditions of employment.
The white capitalist class accumulated capital by first dispossessing African people of the means of production and turning them into wage-slaves. Then white capital accumulated on the basis of depressing wages to the barest minimum, helped by prison-labour, forcing the working class to live in shacks, eat poor diet, have access to poor health and education, etc. The economic crisis has significantly reduced profits and the capitalist class is getting desperate to find ways to increase profits, and now the DA wants to mobilize the unemployed into badly paid jobs in order to recover the profits for the class it represents. The flipside of this is the return to the apartheid state of accumulation by depressing wages and living conditions.
The old trick of pitting the unemployed and the employed is as old as capitalism.
The South African workers have defeated it a long time ago through linking their struggles with the struggles of the broader working class. Not long ago, the evils of our country were well known to have been caused by white domination.
Today white monopoly capital has the guts to openly state that the evils of today are caused by the victims of colonialism. Indeed this is the instance of the political economy of capital in confrontation with the political economy of labour.
From now on, the South African terrain of class struggles will never be the same again. The DA has opened the chapter of open political warfare! They have sown the wind, they shall reap the harvest!
NUMSA, SACCAWU, CWU and the Progressive Youth Alliance calls on the workers and the working class youth of our country to defend COSATU against the disingenuous attacks from the chief political mouthpiece of white monopoly capital and apartheid apologists – the Democratic Alliance (DA).
During the 2011 Local Government Elections we watched angrily as the DA openly insulted the noblest aspirations of our people as contained in the Freedom Charter by launching their political warfare against the mass of the people of this country in Kliptown.
Their confidence is very high, because we have not taken them on, head-on, on their insults.
We call on the workers and the youth to occupy the streets outside COSATU House on Tuesday 15 May 2012. We cannot allow the DA to mock us, having plunged us into poverty, unemployment and extreme inequality; they now want to spit on the shield of the black and African working class.
We are calling on the unemployed youth, those workers dismissed by labour brokers and those workers who will not be working on Tuesday 15 May 2012, to come and defend the federation against chief representatives of white monopoly capital and apartheid apologists – the DA!
We take this opportunity to wish the mothers of our country a happy Mother’s Day.
We are ready!
Come in numbers to oppose DA
Matankana Mothapo, CWU National Spokesperson, 14 May 2012
In the light of intended march by the opportunistic so called Democratic Alliance to COSATU Head Offices in Braamfontein on 15 May 2012, the Communication Workers Union (CWU), which is an affiliate of the revolutionary Cosatu, we urge all our members and non members in the Information, Communication and Technology sector to come in their huge numbers tomorrow to receive useless memorandum from the racist and backward DA – lead by their political charlatan leader called Helen Zille.
CWU would like to inform the racist DA that, our members would descend at COSATU’s National Office in huge numbers to show support to COSATU that the youth wage subsidy is not in the interest of the overwhelming majority of the unemployed youth, but for the benefit of the greedy capitalist bosses who would use the subsidy to dislodge the permanently employed adult workers so as to ensure that their profits are maximised at all costs.
COSATU and its twenty affiliates remains the only genuine leader of the working class and the poor in the workplace and such no amount of grandstanding by the rightwing formations will intimidate us into submission. We are saying:
- No retreat, no surrender! Backwards never.
- Phansi nge- labour brokerage, phansi!
- Run Helen Zille, Run!
March in support of 17 unfairly dismissed Royal Mnandi workers at Wits
Feziwe Ndwayana, 11 May 2012
The Wits (University of the Witwatersrand) Student Representative Council (SRC), Workers Solidarity Committee (WSC) and the Wits All Residence Council (ARC) invite you to a march in demand of the 17 unfairly dismissed workers of Royal Mnandi food service solutions. Royal Mnandi provides catering services to Wits Residence Students.
The March is a culmination of a student boycott of meals in which close to 3000 students have taken part. The students are demanding that all 17 workers be unconditionally reinstated to their jobs. In the first periodic boycott which developed over three days, close to 1600 students boycotted their meals, from the 7-9 May 2012. The march will be held under the following details:
Date: 16th May 2012
Time: 13h15-14h00
Venue: Wits University, Great Hall Stairs (from here to the East Campus of Wits)
ABSA withdraws retrenchment letters
Comfort Duma, SASBO, Assistant General Secretary ABSA, 14 May 2012
“Sasbo - The Finance Union, who represents the majority employees within ABSA, has confirmed that the bank have agreed to withdraw the notices of retrenchment to IT staff, says Comfort Duma, Assistant General Secretary.
“At an urgent meeting between Sasbo and ABSA, held on Saturday evening, the union expressed its outrage at the bank having unilaterally issued retrenchment notices to IT staff via email. The union placed the bank on terms and demanded that ABSA withdraw all retrenchment letters by 12:00 on Monday, 14 May 2012.
“In a letter to Sasbo, the bank advised that it would withdraw the notices of retrenchment sent to IT staff today.
“The bank has agreed to engage further with the union on this matter”, says Duma.
Judge rules in SACTWU’s favour
Andre Kriel, SACTWU General Secretary, 11 May 2012
The Southern African Clothing and Textile Workers’ Union (SACTWU) welcomes today’s Cape High Court ruling by Judge Griesel, compelling Mr. Sam Buthelezi to present himself to the Canyon Springs 417/418 Enquiry into about R100m missing provident fund monies of SACTWU members.
In evidence presented to the Commission of Enquiry thus far, Mr. Buthelezi has emerged as a key figure in the matter. SACTWU hopes that Mr. Buthelezi will honour this FINAL opportunity to present his side of the story.
The final leg of the Enquiry is scheduled to take place, next week, on the 15th to 17th May 2012 in Cape Town.
South Africa
Eulogy at Comrade Sicelo Shiceka’s funeral
Zingiswa Losi, COSATU 2nd Deputy President, 12 May 2012
We are gathering here today to bid farewell to our comrade and friend comrade Sicelo Shiceka – an activist par excellence, a trade union activist, an embodiment of the Alliance, a leader of our movement, a husband, a father, brother and family member to his family and a friend to so many of us present here.
Firstly we are standing here to pass our deepest condolences to his family, friends and many comrades in the liberation movement. Losing a husband and a father at Sicelo’s young age is extremely difficult to contend with. We hope that our presence here today and our continued support as comrades to you as the family will help you deal with your loss.
He was a shop steward in the Paper, Printing, Wood, and Allied Workers Union, became an organiser in 1989, and its provincial secretary in 1990. Before that he had been branch chairperson of the Congress of South African Students in Soweto in 1980 and a member of the Gauteng leadership structure of the Azanian Students Organisation in 1987.
He served all three of the Alliance structures with distinction. As well as his work for PPWAWU and COSATU, he became deputy chairman of the ANC's Kyalami region in 1993, a member of the ANC's Gauteng provincial executive committee in 1996 and the NEC in 2007. He was also a member of the SACP, serving as a member of the party's provincial working committee in 1993.
He then entered government, firstly as Gauteng development planning and local government MEC from 1994 until 1999 when he was elected to parliament and served in both the National Assembly and the National Council of Provinces.
He was provincial and local government minister in former President Kgalema Motlanthe's Cabinet from September 2008 to May 2009 and then as co-operative governance and traditional affairs minister in President Zuma's Cabinet in May 2009.
Sadly Comrade Sicelo’s illustrious career ended in controversy and disgrace when President Jacob Zuma had no option but to dismiss him as minister in October 2011 after Public protector Thuli Madonsela adverse findings. The fact that Comrade Sicelo was recently a controversial figure should never blind us to his lifelong struggle for workers’ rights and national liberation. To us that mistake should draw as a lesson to all of us.
Today as we send him off to his final resting place, we remember his life of struggle and we dip our banners in honour of a liberation warrior who devoted all his life to the service of his fellow South Africans and their struggle for freedom and democracy. He was passionate about the struggle to liberate workers from the chains of apartheid and capitalist exploitation. He was energetic and to him there were no small or big problems. He was always ready to tackle whatever challenge brought to his attention. His passion and drive combined with his everlasting energy saw him criss-crossing the country as a Minister dirtying his hands and solving the problems of countless municipalities. This is the same energy and passion he had demonstrated as the union organiser and leader.
We thank you comrade Sicelo for all the good you have done for workers and our people in general. We mourn your passing and dip our red flags to honour you today and everyday of our lives. Amandla!
Helen Zille must keep her promise and resign over illegal communications tender
Sizwe Pamla, NEHAWU Media Liaison Officer, 13 May 2012
NEHAWU welcomes and supports the outcomes of the provisional report by Public protector, Thuli Madonsela that found that the communications contract between the DA-led Western Cape government and the advertising agency TBWA Hunt Lascaris must be cancelled because it was illegal. What is more vital is that in her report the public protector was explicit in her conclusions that this amounted to "improper conduct and maladministration".
We are now waiting for the Western Cape Premier and DA leader, Ms Helen Zille to honour her promise by handing over her resignation with immediate effect. Ms Zille promised to resign if the probe found irregularities in the handling of the contract. We demand that people, starting with Helen Zille, account on what they knew about this tender and also call for a criminal investigation to be instituted in order to discipline all those who misused the taxpayer’s money.
This tender was not only irregular but the DA and its leader in particular were aware of its irregularity and proceeded to endorse it even after the objections of the provincial treasury. The lack of transparency in this process is an indictment on Helen Zille and her political party who have very high opinion of themselves.
They have been disingenuously lamenting about corruption and poor governance while at the same time, offering their friends irregular tenders. She has for a long time been telling all those who care to listen that her provincial government is the most transparent and has the best financial record keeping in the country. She has proven to be nothing more than a nit-picker and a hypocrite.
She and her lieutenants neglected all proper governance and financial management principles when dealing with this advertising agency because of their weakness for pacifying and pleasing big business at the expense of the poor people. This is a confirmation of our long held view that the DA is a dishonest political party that uses poor people during elections in order to serve their capitalist masters.
We call for an investigation on the prevalence of “tenderpreneurship” in the Western Cape and all DA led municipalities. This position is informed by the fact that not long ago the Public protector discovered some irregularities and “maladministration” in the DA led Midvaal municipality.
Corruption statistics are frightening in this country and we cannot afford to have people who politicize and are hypocritical when addressing issues of corruption. The scourge of corruption is the biggest impediment to the delivery of services to poor people.
Our union wants a new culture of accountability to be introduced where people who have been accused and convicted of corruption are not just dismissed but are made to pay back everything they stole from the taxpayers.
YCLSA calls for Zille to resign
Disang Mocumi, YCLSA Provincial Spokesperson, 14 May 2012
The Young Communist League of South Africa (uFasimba) in the Western Cape is calling for the resignation of Premier Hellen Zille. She has continuously exposed her racist attitude towards Blacks by calling them refugees and systematically removing them from influential positions in Government through a “so called” modernisation process. This process has led to the discontinuation of social security initiatives such as “soup kitchens”, which in the main benefited the impoverished communities which are Africans and Coloureds. The DA continues to deny the working class and poor communities access to basic services such as decent schools and sanitation, and generally there is a skewed allocation of resources and development in favour of affluent communities.
Zille, the leader of DA (our enemy in the struggle for the liberation of the working class) is an agent that seeks to destroy the administration of the ANC by trying hard utilising state resources and its institutions to undermine and challenge pro-poor ANC policy positions. “Holly” Zille has portrayed her organisation as the best in terms of administration in Western Cape but guess what, it is the worst in corruption but has been protected by the media to hide it from the public as if DA is immune to corruption. DA with Zille, are milking the state protect and sustain White privileges.
We welcome the findings by the Public Protector that further confirmed that the Western Cape government is not holier than thou. In fact the modernisation facilitated for the deployment of DA cadres in the administration. In relation to the communications tender, the Public Protector found that the actions of the director general in the premier’s office, Brent Gerber, were “unlawful, improper” and amounted to “maladministration”. The DA government has never had the interest of our people at heart, but always sought to advance the narrow interests of business, the rich and white South Africans. Hellen Zille had promised South Africans that she will resigned if her administration was implicated, but because she is a political chameleon who refuses to resign as previously promised.
Last apartheid leader is unapologetic proponent of racist, fascist system that oppressed majority
Sizwe Pamla, NEHAWU Media Liaison Officer, 13 May 2012
NEHAWU notes with disgust and contempt the attempts by the last Apartheid despot, Mr Frederik Willem de Klerk to defend and justify the immoral policies of the apartheid system but we are not surprised. De Klerk reportedly said that blacks in the homelands were not disenfranchised because they voted and were happy to be afforded space to fulfil their democratic aspirations in their homelands. The rising confidence of the forces that are mobilising against transformation has led to a number of slips of the tongue, not least by Helen Zille who called the indigenous people of our country refugees in their own country.
These statements expose what the masses have always known that De klerk ended apartheid because he and his cabinet could no longer sustain the system and not because he believed that it was an immoral system. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize with a giant like Nelson Mandela but was unfit to be in the same category as those who have won this prize before him. We demand that this award be retracted.
Mr de Klerk has a foundation, the FW de Klerk foundation, which is supposed to continue his apparently “reconciliatory legacy” as a peace loving Nobel Peace Prize laureate. Unfortunately he has failed to dispose of his prejudices and archaic convictions about a system that did not just brutally oppress people in their own land but also divided them along ethnic and racial lines. De Klerk has been working with his foundation and the rest of the anti-majoritarian forces to defend the unjust legacy of Apartheid and stop transformation. They recently led a hysterical campaign lamenting the ANC’s discussion documents for the National Policy Conference in June.
He has, with his foundation, been lecturing all and sundry about human rights and they have been pretending to be defenders of the Constitution who are morally beyond reproach. These re-born constitutionalists and self-appointed embodiments of virtue have been exposed by these statements of Mr de Klerk because he has shown himself to be a staunch fascist who regrets the collapse and is still nostalgic about the evil apartheid empire.
While many men and women of this country are working hard to redress the legacy of poor education, underdevelopment and poor service delivery caused by the apartheid policy of segregation, Mr de Klerk is travelling the world spouting patronizing nonsense. He does not deserve the Nobel Peace Prize.
There are heroes and heroines who paid the ultimate price in the fight to eliminate the system of homelands and these statements are tantamount to spitting on their graves.
These revealing statements are a sign of prejudice that is still harboured by the parties and individuals who are predominantly opposed to the suggestion of a constitutional review. This convergence of right-wingers in different guises of opposition parties, media and non-governmental organisations is a threat to our constitution and the transformation agenda that is being pursued by our democratically elected government. This makes urgent the necessity for all citizens of our country to join the debates around the proposed transformative ideas contained in the ANC Policies.
NEHAWU supports idea to establish a state-owned construction company
Sizwe Pamla, NEHAWU Media Liaison Officer, 13 May 2012
NEHAWU has noted the statements by the Minister of Human Settlements, Mr Tokyo Sexwale that the department is considering the idea of a state-owned construction company. We will always welcome and support any initiative that will result in construction cost reduction and also assist in job creation.
The fact that recent reports show that over 50 housing projects, valued at R4.2bn have been identified for corruption investigation means that the time has come for the issue of a state owned construction company to be explored. It is our long held view that government needs to play an active role in delivering services to the people.
NEHAWU calls on the minister to take those proposals and discussions to the ANC structures so that they can be dealt with in a broader context of the land market, especially urban land, real estate industry and the entire input industry in the building value chain. There is a current discussion on the state owned enterprises and development finance institutions. We see no point in a state owned Construction Company reproducing the apartheid spatial order.
We reiterate our position that all strategic sectors of our economy need to be nationalised especially the steel and cement industries; because all of these progressive proposals will be frustrated by the exorbitant prices of monopoly capital.
As a matter of principle, our union supports the intervention of the state in strategic sectors of the economy, as a way of fast tracking service delivery and fighting corruption. The poor workmanship that has been delivered by private companies and tenderpreneurs in the housing sector has wasted a lot of resources and frustrated the delivery of houses in the country.
NEHAWU still calls on the minister to investigate the looting of the taxpayer’s money by tenderpreneurs who have failed to deliver houses that they were paid for. We want a thorough discussion on this progressive proposal so as to make sure that this idea will not attract crooked elements that will see it as another open door to accessing and looting the resources of the State.
The construction industry has lost skills and the production capacity because lately it has attracted rogues and chancers that are chasing overnight riches. The lack of proper housing in this country means that we can no longer afford to leave this important area of delivery to selfish vultures who want nothing but easy money.
YCL calls for action on Madonsela's W Cape corruption findings
Mangaliso Stalin Khonza, YCLSA National Spokesperson, 13 May 2012
The Young Communist League [uFasimba] calls for action on the findings of mismanagement and maladministration by Adv. Thuli Madonsela on the communications tender exposed by the Sunday Times and investiugated by her office on the Western Cape provincial government.
These findings are indicative of the fact that the Western Cape government is not as hollier than thou as it seeks to project itself, and that the Democratic Alliance has blurred the lines between party-politics and government business.
We call on the other institutions of the state to further investigate and act on the findings of the Public Protector.
Zille must Resign
The YCL further call on the leader of the Democratic Alliance and the Premier of the Western Cape, Hellen Zille, to keep her promise that she will resign if there are findings of irregularity in the communications tender.
At the time of the expose, and when there were calls for investigations, Zille said in a statement that she will resign if there are any findings that implicates her party or government in maladminsitration.
Although Zille is not implicated, and is not bound by any law to resign, the moral code in this instance dictates that she keeps only one of her many promise as a politician and relinquish office. Failure to resign will mean that she is a deceptive, unreliable and cunning leader who only blurps or tweets at the spur of the moment without thinking of the implications, as was the case with her "blacks are refugees" statements and tweets.
We Should Fight Corruption in all fronts
The YCL agrees with the Public Protector on the need to fight corruption in all fronts whenever it rears its ugly head. The notion that because it is only corruption in the public sector or by politicians that are high profile does not mean that the other sector are free of corruption.
In many instances, in civil society, NGO's, trade-unions and in the private sector serious corruption goes unnoticed and affects millions of our people and includes billions of Rands.
In the trade-union movement, for instance, worker leaders are responsible for billions in pension and provident funds money which fund managers are sometimes tempted to corrupt union officials to dictate where investments should be made or funds should be administered.
The same applies to NGO's whom, some, dedicated to fighting corruption, have unknown sources of funding and can only be fought if we as a nation unite to expose such acts.
The YCL remains committed in the fight against corruption and the need for good governance and quality service delivery for all our people.
International
Joint statement by European communist and workers’ parties
1 May 2012
Joint statement issued by communist parties from across the European Union calling for maximum opposition to the Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union and the revised Treaty on the European Stability Mechanism (ESM).
The European Union and the ruling classes of the member states are determined to make working people pay a very heavy price for the deepening crisis of the system.
We Communist and Workers’ parties of the member states of the European Union call on workers across the EU to resist and oppose the adoption of the Treaty on Stability, Coordination and Governance in the Economic and Monetary Union and the revised Treaty on the European Stability Mechanism (ESM).
These two treaties would make “Eurozone” member states and practically all other countries signing these agreements into permanent regimes of economic austerity involving deeper and deeper cuts in public expenditure, rises in indirect taxes, reductions in wages, sustained liberalisation of markets and privatisation of public enterprises, services and vital national assets.
The strategy is to have low wages, low public spending, mass poverty and workers having few rights. The treaties are designed to make these measures into a permanent feature of the EU that are impossible to reverse.
The impact of these treaties will not be confined to the member states of the Eurozone. They will provide the bench-mark for further attacks on workers’ rights and conditions across the whole of the EU. The ruling classes have declared open warfare on workers in a generalised offensive.
These treaties are designed to neutralise the potential of national working class formations to influence or change national economic and social policy. They, along with previous treaties, are about blocking any avenues for the working class to defend itself or to promote policies of social progress and a socialist alternative.
They will make austerity permanent by continuous external interference of EU institutions in the affairs of member states in relation to economic and social policy, in the interests of monopoly capitalism.
In this they have the active collaboration of the ruling class and its political representatives in each country. These treaties will further negate and deeply undermine national and sovereign rights.
Any policies that the ruling classes across the European Union can deliver will inevitably make the people pay for this crisis of capitalism. Promoting the interests of the working class is only possible by confronting and breaking with this destructive system.
We, Communist and Workers’ Parties value and salute the mass response from the workers and other social strata affected by the measures and policies of big capital, in Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Italy and call upon workers and their trade unions, and people’s mass organisations, to resist these renewed attacks and to mobilise and assert a working class response to the crisis of state monopoly capitalism.
In the immediate battles of today our parties will present the vision of Socialism as the answer to the crisis of the capitalist system.
Workers’ Party of Belgium
Communist Party of Britain
Communist Party in Denmark
Communist Party of Finland
German Communist Party
Communist Party of Greece
Hungarian Communist Workers’ Party
Communist Party of Ireland
Party of Italian Communists
Communist Party of Luxembourg
Communist Party of Malta
New Communist Party of the Netherlands
Communist Party of Poland
Portuguese Communist Party
Communist Party of Spain
Communist Party of Sweden
Communist Party of Germany
SWAYOCO supports 100% PUDEMO NEC latest position on SSN shenanegans
Justice Dlamini, SWAYOCO Secretary General, 12 May 2012
The entire leadership of SWAYOCO, acting on its full mandate of representing progressive views of all oppressed young people of our country Swaziland and defending our only glorious organ PUDEMO, as the spear heard of the gigantic march towards democracy. We wish to categorically affirm and uphold the positions clearly and immaculately advanced by the latest National Executive Committee meeting statement issued through the office of Secretary General. There can`t be any liberation movement worth its salt that can allow anyone including SSN leadership and its cronies to conduct its business in such a nefarious and unbecoming conduct in the name of solidarity
We wish to point out that SWAYOCO members who had come to recognize the SSN office as main theatre of struggle to take heed of the clear call made by PUDEMO NEC in relation to the latest position on SSN. All those who still regard themselves as part of this organ are expected without hesitation to tore the line. This should not be viewed as a call to start debates in the cyberspace; we are least interested in endless rhetorics by people who think this organ can be taken for-granted. The time for negotiations and persuasions is over and finish. No one anywhere in the globe has the right to insult our leadership, in particular President Mario Masuku or any member of the CEC and NEC. We the foot soldiers of the people`s movement declare now hence forth that we take extreme offence at any organization and individuals who believe they have struggled so well than all, that now they have earned the honor to call any individual leader or organization obscene names and hail the worst form of insult all in the name of solidarity and or international work. We shall never be told by the enemy of the People’s movement what not and what to.
On the legitimacy of PUDEMO leadership, we want to put it straight, that we have never questioned the legitimacy nor the credibility of our leadership in PUDEMO. Let everyone know here and now that SWAYOCO remains one of the most disciplined structures of PUDEMO as such remains bound by its resolutions and Principles. If there are any contentious issues there has always been proper structures where any matter could be raised, not in face book nor SSN forum. By the way we want to remind all SWAYOCO members, that they remain PUDEMO members and are bound by the constitution of SWAYOCO and PUDEMO but most importantly by the glorious traditions in particular in the area of revolutionary discipline. The resolutions and Principles apply to all PUDEMO members 24/7 and every where they are whether at Mister bread or anywhere in the world.
A point of clarity is equally being made on the attention seeking conduct of one lucky lukhele. As a former marshal of SWAYOCO you are hereby assured that the net is closing for all who think PUDEMO is kinder garden where individuals discover themselves if they can walk or crawl. The two PUDEMO Congress resolutions on the matter of solidarity organs and members of our organ is quite clear to all including you. if you need explanations you should have consulted us long time ago probable we could have rescued you in understanding what exactly we meant as an organization when we said no Swazi can be in solidarity with him or herself
On his latest conduct we expect the PUDEMO NEC to take even more stern measures disciplining this comrade who has turned a law unto himself.
For one to declare bloodshed inside the movement is enough to warrant a dismissal, however we recommend an immediate suspension on “this Lucky Lukhele” until we ascertain ourselves if he’s indeed sane to face any disciplinary processes On T-shirt Communists
Let the progressive world be assured that our mother body is not on a mission to purge communist as some handful in dark corners wish to mislead the world into believing. SWAYOCO has enjoyed a rich, principled and disciplined revolutionary foresight for many generations of PUDEMO of whom many were made of true communist. Our PUDEMO remains a discipline force of the left as such harbors no intention of crushing left class alienation of this glorious movement.
What PUDEMO will not entertain is a cult of Janja weedism pausing as communist in cyberspace. The name of our organ PUDEMO remains special and precious, as young militant soldiers under the commandership of the greatest commander President Mario “Bhambata” Masuku we are at the disposal of your leadership for any task. We are sick and tired of being patient to a bunch of clowns who really now believe they are special. Class biasness must not be distorted for extremism and thug life.
Hands off our President Hands off, Away with ill discipline attention seeking clowns away! and forward to democracy in SD Forward!
SSN supports blockade of imports to Swaziland
Lucky Lukhele, SSN Spokesperson, 14 May, 2012
The Swaziland Solidarity Network (SSN) supports the decision by the Swaziland Transport and Allied Workers Union (STAWU) to block all imports going into Swaziland from the 11th to the 29th of this month by engaging in a nation-wide strike.
STAWU’s militant stance was communicated to IOL news by STAWU’s Sipho Dwindle. The blockade is meant to force the Swazi government to concede to a list of demands such as the rollback of the recently introduced Value Added Tax (VAT), the expediting of issuance of transport licences and the closure of the controversial bus rank in Manzini.
The union has called upon workers from all other sectors to join their strike. It stressed that the key demand is the one relating to VAT. Last month the Swazi government introduced VAT to most commodities sold in the country, which saw prices of food and other basic necessities skyrocket, making Swaziland probably the most expensive country in the sub-region.
Interestingly, social expenditure has been reduced and basic services such as health are in shambles as most hospitals still have shortages of medicine. Student allowances have been reduced by up to 65%, and the number of tertiary students on government loans has been reduced, with 700 of them forced to roam the streets despite the fact that they were eligible for funding.
Elderly social grants have also been suspended in king Mswati’s biased austerity measures which have seen him receive private Jet from unidentified donors. The SSN fully supports the strike and hopes that the entire nation will join in it and make the country ungovernable. We also calls upon South African transport workers to stage a sympathy picket’s support of the Swazis.
Announcements
Walter Sisulu Century Symposiums
The Ahmed Kathrada Foundation together with the ANC Gauteng and the Sisulu family will be celebrating the life and legacy of Tata Walter Sisulu on the 18th and 19th of May. We will appreciate your presence at both events if possible.
To RSVP, please Click Here <http://akfza.yolasite.com
- Date: 18 May 2012 (Friday)
- Time: 18h00
- Venue: Wits Great Hall
· RSVP: Shades...@gmail.com or call 011 854 0082
- Date: 19 May 2012 (Saturday)
- Time: 14h00 – 17h00
- Venue: UJ Soweto Campus
· RSVP: Shades...@gmail.com or call 011 854 0082
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Industrialisation and the green economy; experiences from Germany
Makoma Lekalakala, Earthlife Africa, 10 May 2012
The Rosa Luxemburg Foundation and Earthlife Africa like to invite you to a round table discussion on industrialisation and the green economy, with special reference to Germany.
A German consultant on energy and policies, Mr. Dieter Seifried, is visiting South Africa next week as he will address the Cosatu International Conference on the German experience of promoting industrialisation while pursuing a green economy. We would like to utilise that opportunity to organise an exchange of ideas, opinions and experiences between him and you and invite you therefore herewith to a round table discussion.
Date: Wednesday 17 May 2012
Time: 10.00 hrs till 14.00 hrs
Venue: Rosa Luxemburg Offices at 237 Jan Smuts Avenue, Parktown North
Tea and lunch will be provided.
For further information and confirmation to attend, contact Earthlife Africa (Makoma) at 082 682 9177 or the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation (Jos) at 082 959 1492.
Kind regards,
Makoma Lekalakala, Earthlife Africa, Johannesburg
Jos Martens, Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, Southern Africa Regional Office, Johannesburg
Introduction Dieter Seifried
Dieter Seifried is director of the German consultancy firm Büro Ö-quadrat which is specialized in energy economics and policies. It works with renowned German institutions like the German Federal Ministry of Environment, the German Energy Agency, the Wuppertal Institute, the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) and the UNEP-Centre on Sustainalbe Consumption and Production. Mr. Seifreid is also lecturer at the University of Freiburg in energy efficiency and energy politicy frameworks.
From 1983 to 1999 he was staff member, coordinator and project leader at the Öko-Institut (Institute for Applied Ecology) where he focused on eco-friendly concepts for the energy sector, least-cost planning, contracting and green power.
The Öko-Institut is a leading European research and consultancy institute with 140 staff which develops principles and strategies for realising the vision of sustainable development globally, nationally and locally. Its work is organised around the subjects of Chemicals Management and Technology Assessment, Energy and Climate, Emission and Ambient Pollution Control, Radiation Protection, Agriculture and Biodiversity, Sustainability in Consumption, Mobility, Resource Management and Industry, Nuclear Engineering and Facility Safety as well as Law, Policy and Governance. Based on value-oriented research, the institute provides consultancy for decision-makers in politics, industry and civil society. Key clients are ministries and federal agencies, industrial enterprises and the European Union.
Patrick Craven (National Spokesperson)
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 or 010 219-1339
Mobile: +27 82 821 7456
E-Mail: pat...@cosatu.org.za
