Relations between the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and the South African Communist Party (SACP) plummeted this week, with some communist leaders accusing Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi of positioning himself for the SACP’s top position after he publicly urged Higher Education Minister Blade Nzimande to return full-time to his position in the SACP.
Nzimande is also the general secretary of the SACP.
At the same time leaders of two Cosatu affiliates told the Mail & Guardian that Cosatu unions had not authorised Vavi’s call to Nzimande, which he made after the federation’s central executive committee (CEC) meeting last week.
It has also emerged that some union leaders, including those from the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and teachers’ union the South African Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu), criticised Vavi at the CEC meeting for his public attacks on alliance leaders, including those in the ANC. But it is understood that other affiliates, including the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) and the National Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu), came to his defence.
Vavi believes that he is being increasingly targeted because of his outspokenness. He told journalists last week the CEC had expressed the view that Nzimande should lead the SACP full-time so it could confront the challenges of the working class.
Four of the party’s top-five leaders have full-time jobs outside the party. Its deputy general secretary, Jeremy Cronin, is also deputy transport minister; its chairperson Gwede Mantashe also serves as ANC secretary general; and treasurer Phumulo Masualle is also ANC chairperson in the Eastern Cape and provincial planning and finance minister.
Leaders of Cosatu affiliates raised concerns about this at last week’s CEC. But NUM general secretary Frans Baleni and Sadtu president Thobile Ntola told the M&G this week there was no decision to urge Nzimande to return to the SACP.
Baleni and Ntola expressed concern that Cosatu national office-bearers, including Vavi, had publicly called for Nzimande to return to the SACP instead of engaging the party privately. “Cosatu and the SACP are independent alliance structures. No other structure is allowed to decide how the other should run its affairs. Going out publicly about this matter is not the best mechanism,” said Baleni.
But both Baleni and Ntola insisted they will abide by Cosatu’s decisions.
Cosatu insiders claimed this week that Vavi’s public call to Nzimande was a strategic move to position himself to take Nzimande’s SACP position.
“Many in Cosatu have taken a position that the general secretary should be full-time and Vavi knows that Nzimande is unlikely go back to the SACP on a full-time basis.
“He obviously raised the matter to win support from union members to push him to take over from Nzimande,” said one Cosatu official and SACP member.
Vavi admitted this week that “one or two people” were unhappy with his public stance, but said most CEC members agreed with him. “I find it extremely uncomfortable to talk about internal issues in the media, but I’m forced to because other people came to you with that information.”
He was aware that he was seen as positioning himself as a future SACP general secretary, but said he was being unfairly singled out.
“I have become a target just because I honestly represent the decisions taken by a collective, some of them uncomfortable,” he said.
Vavi said those who disowned the CEC’s resolution were “bowing to pressure”. His views on the SACP were supported by the CEC’s political discussion paper of September, which outlined Cosatu’s unhappiness with the SACP’s poor performance.
“Increasingly the SACP is unable to play its proper role. It is in danger of becoming more and more invisible, given the full-time role of its office-bearers in government and the ANC.”
Insiders said the tension between Nzimande and Vavi could spill over and mar the relationship between Mantashe and the Cosatu leader.
Cosatu’s attacks on the SACP’s poor performance because of absentee leaders also applied to Mantashe, though he was not named in Cosatu statements.
One SACP central committee member claimed that the tensions between Cosatu and the SACP were fuelled by worsening relations between Vavi and Mantashe.
SACP national spokesperson MalÂesela Maleka said the party was shocked by Cosatu’s behaviour. “When people persist in raising things in public the way they are doing, it lends credence to suspicions that there are tensions betwÂeen the two organisations.”