Members of three trade unions surrounded Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) congress delegates with textile lines made up of 40 000 pieces of cloth, representing the number of workers who had lost their jobs in the South African industry in the last two years.
Cosatu president Willie Madisha on Tuesday noted that each cloth represented 10 people who were affected “by each job loss” — or 400 000 people.
The three unions involved in the textile protest were Sactwu (South African Clothing and Textile Workers’ Union), Saccawu (the South African Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers’ Union) and Nehawu (the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union).
In a joint resolution by the three unions, they called for a nationalisation “under workers’ control” of the commanding heights of the economy, industries or companies where retrenchments were envisaged or had taken place.
The unions also urged that the state should provide “a living unemployed benefit of at least R3 000 a month”. The unions noted that the proposed R100 basic income grant “is wholly insufficient to meet the needs of the poor and unemployed”.
The three unions also called for the rejection of free trade agreements — bilateral or multilateral — that would lead to job losses and pledged to work with unions elsewhere in the world to defeat attempts through the World Trade Organisation to limit policy space for developing countries.
The unions urged Cosatu and the South African Communist Party to “do everything in their power to redirect the energy of the state towards a planned economy capable of meeting the needs of the people and the poor … such a planned economy must not rule out the possibilities of nationalisation and redistribution of the country’s vast and enormous material resources”. — I-Net Bridge