A NATIONAL strike across South Africa against the rising costs of living, load shedding, and other economic challenges will take place on 24 August, the leadership of the South African Federation of Trade Unions (Saftu) has said.
This was decided at SAFTU’s Working Class Summit in Boksburg last Friday.
The national shutdown will see Saftu, its union affiliates, and like-minded organisations protesting nationwide in three weeks.
Saftu had an estimated 725 078 individual members in 21 affiliated unions in 2018.
It remains to be seen how successful the national shutdown will be, as the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) held such a national strike last year, with little discernable economic effect.
Also complicating the dynamics, Saftu, which comprises unions that left Cosatu after union leader Zwelinzima Vavi was expelled from the ANC-aligned federation, is now also at odds with the leadership of its largest member union, the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa).
Last Friday’s Working Class Summit was the first such gathering since July 2018 when they endorsed a declaration to mobilise on behalf of workers against the ‘crisis of late stage capitalism’. Since then however, the Covid-19 pandemic and continued government failures have worsened economic volatility and destroyed jobs.
The struggle over the future of South Africa’s labour movement is therefore due to take place at this conference
Saftu president Ruth Ntlokotse took Numsa to court on Friday seeking a contempt of court ruling after Numsa held a national congress that she had previously successfully interdicted.
She was suspended as Numsa’s second deputy president ahead of the national congress, which elected Puleng Phaka to that position instead.
Ntlokotse’s suspension was, however, lifted at the eleventh hour as the Numsa leadership scrambled to comply with the court order.
Ntlokotse addressed the Working Class Summit on Friday and said the working class faced unprecedented economic pressures from rising costs including the inflation rate, electricity tariffs, fuel prices, and food costs.
She lamented the country’s 45.6% and rising unemployment rate – disproportionately felt among young South Africans – expanded by two million job losses as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.
‘Due to the failed state, our people are under siege,’ she said.
‘The level of poverty and squalor produced by capitalism makes matters worse for women and children.
‘In Kagiso we saw criminal labour systems exploiting both poor residents and foreign labourers.’
Ntlokotse said the Saftu leadership, along with the leadership of affiliates and social partners, had decided to hold a national strike at the end of the month to protest against these economic pressures.
‘As a reflection of unity in struggle, we have resolved to begin planning for national mobilisation, specifically on 24 August.
‘We are looking forward to a fruitful and robust engagement as we plan to seek ways to challenge the social ills that confront the working class, to unite our struggles, and to find more inspiring victories,’ she said.
Ntlokotse stressed that Saftu declares that it will work together with other trade union federations, unions, and organisations.
‘We need unity on the ground, not just a declaration. We declared that business and government austerity, especially in the public service, will be opposed’ she said.
Princess Majola from the Assembly of The Unemployed said the expansion of grants from the South African Social Security Agency (Sassa) had become more urgent as unemployment remains stubbornly high.
She said the government’s expanded public works programme (EPWP) often did not reach the poorest among South Africa’s youth.
‘With some 11 million unemployed – over 40% being youth and women being forced into unpaid labour – we had our president tell us that government does not create jobs, but businesses do.
‘The government is giving EPWP programmes and these do not serve the poorest,’ she said.
The Climate Justice Coalition’s Alex Lenferna said South Africa was failing to make progress in adding renewables to the grid, despite the renewables being the cheapest form of power in several economies, because the government wanted to continue facilitating corrupt non-renewable contracts.
‘When we look at the depth of the corruption, we look at the criminal escalation of costs in coal contracts and we look at Medupi and Kusile.
The next Medupi is coming in the form of Karpowership which Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe is trying to push for.
‘We are one of the biggest polluters. The harm of that pollution falls on the poor and the working class,’ said Lenferna.
Gabriel Mabitle of #PayTheGrants said with the cost of living rising sharply for low-income households, the grassroots organisation believes that the redistribution of wealth in South Africa had to be implemented through progressive tax systems.
‘As #PayTheGrants, we want a universal basic income grant and reject a means test system.
‘The universality is critical, because without it you have to have a means test, and that is akin to asking who is more poor or being asked to prove that you are poor,’ said Mabitle.
Saftu and its social partners will hold several events in the run-up to the national strike, including a stakeout outside of the precinct of Parliament on 16 August against gender-based violence, and on the same day, a commemoration of the Marikana massacre, where SA state forces gunned down striking miners, at the koppie where the shooting took place.
- More unions at the public service wage talks on Friday rejected the government’s offer of a 2% wage increase. The government now has a week to respond to avoid a deadlock or a possible strike.
Unions in the public service met with the government last Friday in a bid to strike a public wage deal, but unions roundly rejected the government’s offer. The government has until next week Friday (14 August) to formulate a response to union demands, which currently range between 4% and 6.5%.
This comes after the Public Servants’ Association (PSA) said it would pursue a fresh dispute against the government earlier this week, after it claimed union demands would be unaffordable and it would only be able to pay an increase from the date a deal is signed, not retrospectively from April this year.
Government had tabled a final offer of 2% – with a sliding scale where salary levels 1 to 4 will receive 3%, levels 5 to 8 will receive 2.10%, and levels 9 to 12 will receive 1.50%.
Negotiations coordinator for the Cosatu bloc of public sector unions, Simon Hlungwani, said Cosatu affiliates in the talks rejected the government’s offer.
‘We have rejected the offer, except for one that was already outside council.
‘The employer representatives said the unions don’t have a mandate on rejection. If they come back and they don’t improve, then we must go into conciliation because it will be a deadlock.’
Hlungwani said that by 12 August the employer must to reply to labour’s demands, failing this, a deadlock would be declared.
From there the matter would either be referred to conciliation, followed by arbitration, or a possible strike.
‘It’s not an exclusive process. After deadlocking, there must be a conciliation. If you don’t find each other you go to arbitration. If that fails there is a right reserved, including a right to strike,’ he said.
Hlungwani could not confirm reports that Cosatu met with Minister of Employment and Labour Thulas Nxesi in his capacity as acting minister of Public Service and Administration to find a political solution to the public service wage talks.
PSA’s Reuben Maleka said that as far as the union was concerned, other unions were free to join the PSA in its dispute against the government.
‘It’s up to other unions to join the PSA dispute that is ongoing. We believe we have been left with no other avenue other than a dispute,’ said Maleka.
The National Treasury indicated Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana’s interest in getting involved in the public service wage talks earlier this week, but the PSA warned that increased involvement from the finance minister would only push progress in the negotiations back.
Public Service and Administration spokesperson Moses Mushi previously said that the department would not comment on ongoing negotiations as it prefers to avoid being seen to be conducting negotiations through the media.
