Jaspreet Kindra
A conservative faction in the African National Congress, linked to Peter Mokaba, is planning to dust off and table a controversial document at the upcoming alliance summit, calling for the labour movement to submit to the ANC’s political leadership.
Sources said the document, titled The Role of Progressive Trade Unions, caused a “scandal” when it was presented at a 1999 ANC national executive committee meeting.
It emerged this week that the document is being redrafted in the light of the Congress of South African Trade Union’s (Cosatu) anti-privatisation strike last week, with an eye to resubmitting it at the October summit.
Last week Mokaba said the political alliance between the ANC, Cosatu and the South African Communist Party was dead, adding that the union federation could not operate as a political organisation.
The document says: “The ANC played an important role in the formation of Cosatu. The challenge is for the ANC to take the leadership role in the alliance, in form and content, strategic and tactical.”
It adds that the while the ANC must support Cosatu’s right to bargain collectively and defend workers’ rights, “the job of trade union leadership is to help their members understand the very real problem of job losses”.
The document says Cosatu should extend campaigns beyond the shop floor and engage the alliance on the effects of economic restructuring. However, this should be under the political leadership of the ANC.
“Our history proves that the progressive trade union movement has always been stronger when senior political leaders from the ANC and the SACP take active part in and are part of the trade union movement,” the document reads.
Northern Province Premier Ngoako Ramatlhlodi, one of the original authors of the document, aired similar views in the last edition of the ANC journal Umrabulo.
Ramatlhlodi suggests Cosatu should accept the ANC as the political leader of the alliance.
“It is mainly the task of the ANC and the party as the highest organisational and ideological expression of the working class to consistently to provide leadership. The trade union movement on its own, because of its very nature, cannot grasp this fact,” Ramatlhlodi argues.
Sources say the newer version of the document could be toned down under the guidance of ANC secretary general Kgalema Motlanthe. The faction behind the document also considers it problematic that the SACP provides political leadership to Cosatu.
The ANC Youth League president Malusi Gigaba this week also expressed concern about the exclusion of the ANC from bilateral meetings held between Cosatu and the SACP.
Glenda Daniels reports that in the wake of Cosatu’s anti-privatisation strike last week, all members of the alliance concede they have been talking past each other and that constructive engagement is needed.
The ANC, Cosatu and the SACP said this week that the only way to resolve the impasse is through an urgent meeting.
Besides differences in strategies for economic growth, unresolved areas are the nature of negotiations, the forums in which the disagreements were raised and the level of representations to the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac).
Nedlac head Phillip Dexter said he believed there was space for compromise. “There is a need for case by case discussions over privatisation. We can’t take care of the problem by ducking the issues, but all the parties must get their personal feelings out of the way. We also need a public debate on privatisation.”
Dexter said the government and the unions had to commit themselves to a series of meetings, as they had in negotiations over amendments to the Labour Relations Act, and send delegations of sufficient stature.
Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi agreed on the need for agreements. But he added: “There are non-negotiables; basic services must not be privatised. To break the logjam, we should go back to the Reconstruction and Development Programme.”
The ANC’s Kgalema Motlanthe says: “We need a discussion without pretences. We can’t oversimplify the issues here.”
SACP head Blade Nzimande says the only way forward was through collective debate and engagement.