The National Union of Metalworkers (Numsa) has criticised the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) for ignoring issues confronting the country’s working class and waging a war against South Africa’s democratic state instead of ”dismantling the stronghold of white monopoly capital”.
The latter charge is a clear reference to Cosatu’s attacks on President Thabo Mbeki’s government, and is likely to fuel conflict between labour’s pro-Mbeki and pro-Jacob Zuma camps. Numsa’s leaders are seen by many in the federation as being close to Luthuli House.
In a carefully constructed response to Cosatu’s political discussion docuÂÂment released last month, the union also calls for Cosatu to implement its 2015 Plan in building a strong union movement.
This contradicts the Cosatu position paper, which questions the releÂÂvance of the 2015 Plan against the background of sweeping political developments in the alliance over the past three years — including the perceived inability of the African National Congress-led government to stem unemployment, the rise of a black bourgeoisie and the ANC’s failure to force the state to follow party policies.
Cosatu’s Possibilities for Fundamental Social Change had questioned whether the 2015 Plan, designed to build working-class power, could ever succeed if the federation remained part of the alliance.
The Numsa document, Breaking New Ground on the Most Vexing Questions Confronting Our Revolution, was distributed to its provincial structures this week ahead of Cosatu’s ninth national congress next month.
It says: ”Given the fact that the ruling class in South Africa is still white monopoly capital, what is it that we as the national liberation movement must do to change property relations in society and to dismantle the stronghold of white monopoly capital?
”From the Cosatu political discussion paper, other than reference to the second decade as the decade of the working class, does it concretely say what struggles we must wage to defeat white monopoly capital, and in what form and with whom?”
It asks what substantial changes have taken place, suggesting that the 2015 Plan needs to be revised. Numsa believe implementation of the 2015 Plan, if carried out, will strengthen the alliance and enable workers to influence government decisions.
Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said he was unable to comment until he had read the Numsa document.
The 2015 Plan
The Cosatu seminal 2015 Plan, which was first released at the federation’s eighth national congress in 2003, is aimed at strengthening the components of the tripartite alliance through strengthening working-class formations. Part of the 2015 Plan was to increase Cosatu’s membership to four million. The plan aims to re-entrench policy debates and social programmes which have been neglected as a result of the political debate in the tripartite alliance. Also in the plan is a move to create a super union by merging some of the smaller affiliates. — Matuma Letsoalo