The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) on Wednesday vowed to distribute its anti-Congress of the People (Cope) booklet to as many places as possible.
”We are also trying to have the booklet [translated] to Zulu. We will be distributing them to as many voters and workers as we can,” said Cosatu KwaZulu-Natal secretary Zet Luzipho.
He said the booklet was distributed to the offices of Cosatu’s alliance partners.
The 14-page document was penned by Cosatu president Sidumo Dlamini and general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. It concluded with ”Yours truly” and their names. Luzipho confirmed that the booklet was ”signed by its president and general secretary”.
It is entitled Defend our Movement: Advance the Gains of Polokwane! Expose and Isolate the Black DA.
Dozens of the maroon booklets — bearing African National Congress and Cosatu logos — were available at both organisations’ headquarters in KwaZulu-Natal this week.
Among other things, it states that Cope could cause ”great damage” to trade union federations if it were to come to power in the general election.
”If these dissidents succeed, it will roll back the gains workers and the poor have made since 1994 … unless we defeat it, even this small splinter could cause great damage to our movement,” it reads.
”The launch of [Cope] poses a big challenge to workers and the national liberation movement.
”It could confuse and divide voters, cause enough damage to reduce the ANC majority in Parliament … and put the brakes on policies to create jobs, cut poverty and improve the lives of South Africans.”
The booklet also accuses Cope president Mosiuoa Lekota and his deputy president, Mbhazima Shilowa, of leaving the ruling party to ”pursue an agenda … of the capitalist class”.
The move is described as a ”coalition of conservative forces”.
”Their role is to dislodge a progressive ruling party that has the support of the majority and impose the agenda of international capital and its local allies.
”It’s no accident that almost all the dissident leaders, including former trade unionists, are now wealthy business people.”
It further accuses Lekota and Shilowa of using leadership positions in the ANC, the South African Communist Party and Cosatu, to accumulate wealth and dispense patronage.
”They and some of their families benefited from what we now call the ‘1996 Class Project’, which imposed neo-liberal, pro-business and pro-rich Gear policy in the late 1990s.
”They are beneficiaries of the narrow BEE [black economic empowerment] policy that has given a small number of Africans shares in big companies.”
According to the document, these policies led to the retrenchment of thousands of workers, with at least 15 000 job losses at Telkom alone.
”The very people who, with their capitalist allies, are now mobilising for the dissidents were the most enthusiastic promoters of the pro-capitalist policies that caused all these problems.”
Luzipho said the booklet’s aim was to ”set the record straight” so that voters did not get confused.
”We want the people to know that the same people who yesterday defended the ANC and its alliance partners are now changing their tune and attacking the alliance.
”If by small chance they rule the country, they will erode everything the workers had gained…” — Sapa