Howard Barrell
Militants among the 12 trade unions representing almost a million civil servants have effectively given President Thabo Mbeki an ultimatum: find a settlement to the public sector pay dispute over the next two weeks or face paralysis in the public service.
The stand-off comes amid signs that the cancellation of a scheduled summit this week of leaders of the tripartite alliance has placed serious strains on relations between some leaders of the African National Congress, the South African Communist Party and the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu).
Senior state officials indicate that the government is pinning its hopes of a solution to the pay dispute on its belief that civil servants will conclude they do not have enough public support to go on strike.
“The difference between their demand and our offer is about 1%. Will the public support massive disruption of services for that?” asked one senior government official on Thursday.
The committee which decides the government’s negotiating position met on Wednesday and authorised no increase over the R3,28-billion allocated for a civil service pay rise under an earlier offer.
That offer, which the government said was final, falls short of the unions’ last revision of their demand for a pay increase – down from 10% to 7,3%, with 8% for teachers.
The government argues that the public sector wage bill is already too big and is squeezing out much-needed capital investment in the provision of services.
The 12 public sector unions, which also met in Pretoria on Wednesday, have called for an urgent meeting with Mbeki. If Mbeki does not find a solution by August 24, according to Fikile Majola, general secretary of the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu), the 12 unions will meet on August 27 to take a final decision of industrial action.
Current indications are that the more militant of the 12, such as Nehawu and the South African Democratic Teachers’ Union will opt for full-blown strikes and street protests. Other, more conservative unions, and workers in essential services who are not allowed to strike, are expected to resort to other forms of protest.
In the interim, work stoppages and disruptions by civil servants will escalate over the next week as leaders of the 12 public sector trade unions hold report backs for members and head sporadic protests, according to Majola.
A number of the unions involved are holding executive meetings over the weekend to confirm plans for further action, he added.
Strike action by civil servants could coincide with a separate, broader campaign of protests by Cosatu, the country’s largest union federation. Cosatu is planning a series of marches, rallies, demonstrations and work stoppages to protest against retrenchments, high interest rates, and job losses resulting from sharp reductions in import tariffs on some goods. The Cosatu campaign is directed against the government, business and the Reserve Bank.
Two weeks ago, Cosatu gave notice of the planned campaign to the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac), as required under the Labour Relations Act. The Act gives workers the right to take part in protest actions to promote or defend their socio-economic interests and to be protected against disciplinary and other sanctions for doing so.
If Nedlac cannot find an alternative way of addressing Cosatu’s grievances, the federation can embark on its planned protests two weeks after serving a second notice on the council.
Trade union officials and SACP leaders not serving in the government said this week they were being inexplicably cold- shouldered by the ANC leadership as the country faced the prospect of the most serious industrial action since 1994 and a threat of paralysis in the civil service.
The ANC’s left-wing partners are concerned that the ruling party’s indefinite postponement of the alliance summit has blocked, at a crucial moment, discussion of government economic policy. Cosatu and the SACP had placed the government’s policy for growth, employment and redistribution (Gear) and privatisation on the summit agenda. They were amazed to hear last weekend that preparations for this week’s summit could not be completed in time.
Government leaders would prefer that the debate over macro-economic policy be considered closed.
“There is deep concern. Relations are very tense,” a senior SACP source said. “There is a feeling that some people in the ANC want Cosatu and the SACP to help in an election campaign, but then drop us as soon as it’s over.”
Majola said he and other Cosatu unionists found inexplicable the government’s insistence that the public sector wage dispute be viewed as a straight worker/employer interaction which should be isolated from political influence – even though the government was the employer.
“There will have to be political intervention,” he said.