The Congress of South African Trade Unions called on the African National Congress on Tuesday to arrange an urgent meeting to discuss tensions between the two organisations.
”We are calling on the ANC to exercise its leadership role,” Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi told reporters in Johannesburg.
As the leader of the tripartite alliance — made up of the ANC, Cosatu and the SA Communist Party — the ANC has the primary responsibility to organise the meeting, he said.
Vavi said, however, it was not in the interest of the alliance to keep ”the current levels of tension going into the future”.
”We want an end to this… if we had the choice we would be in a meeting as we speak to iron out the issues,” he said, adding that they had already had informal talks with ANC leaders who agree on the need to meet.
This comes after comments on Sunday by ANC spokesman Smuts Ngonyama at the funeral of National Council of Provinces’ chairwoman Joyce Kgoali.
”We believe, as the ANC, that it is very unfortunate that at a time when we are supposed to be having very, very responsible leaders … we are confronted by a situation where we have a leader who is continuously reckless and continues to fire statements that are highly toxic, statements that are heedless, and statements that are impetuous,” Ngonyama said of Vavi.
Tuesday’s comments followed a meeting of Cosatu’s national leadership and its affiliates to discuss the tensions in the alliance.
Vavi said Cosatu condemned the personalising of the disagreements.
”The personal attacks on and questioning of the good faith of the federation and its leaders appear designed to divert attention away from the real issues that we should be debating within the alliance.”
Vavi said Ngonyama’s comments could have had personal motivations; Ngonyama is part of a consortium seeking to acquire a 15,1 percent stake in Telkom.
Vavi said Cosatu would not relinquish its independence and would continue to publicly debate the issues which have led to the current tensions, including black economic empowerment and the political and economic situation in Zimbabwe.
”We will not be intimidated, because we believe the issues we are raising are the correct issues.”
He said that the alliance needs to hold regular and frequent meetings to engage on issues. ”We would not have found ourselves in this situation if we met regularly.”
Cosatu president Willie Madisha said the alliance had not functioned properly for a number of years. ”There is a backlog of issues [needing] to be discussed.”
The arguments started last week when Vavi told reporters that the ANC’s attitude towards Cosatu meant that the federation should ”keep quiet, move out of politics, be a quiet lapdog. We refuse to do that”.
He said the ANC was suggesting that if Cosatu did not want to comply, then the federation should ”walk, because we will just label you with anything possible in the world to the point that you get so angry that you walk out of the tripartite alliance”.
But the alliance was not in danger, Vavi said on Tuesday. ”The tripartite alliance is far bigger than personal attacks on me.”
The South African Communist Party said it was dismayed and puzzled by the personal attacks directed against Vavi.
”Interventions that are full of menace, threat, allusions to collaboration with ‘outside’ forces, and of personal ridicule are worrying,” SACP spokesman Kaizer Mohau said.
”It is a style that, unfortunately, characterises much of the official discourse in Zimbabwe, contributing directly to the climate of intolerance and political stagnation in our neighbouring country.” Mohau called for rational debate about black economic empowerment and Zimbabwe. – Sapa