he general secretary of the South African Federation of Trade Unions. (Delwyn Verasamy, M&G)
The 26-year-old Cosatu employee has accused Vavi of raping her in January this year.
The woman filed a complaint with Cosatu and subsequently demanded a R2-million payoff from Vavi and his wife in exchange for not pressing criminal charges. Vavi has since pressed charges of extortion against the woman.
A Cosatu inquiry will convene on Monday following the lodging of a formal grievance by the woman.
Speaking to the Mail & Guardian on Sunday, she repeated what she once tweeted, that "one day the truth will come out and the innocent will be set free".
"Other than that I do not wish to engage with the media, that is Vavi's platform. I will have mine at the Cosatu internal process [on Monday]," she said.
Vavi insists that the rape allegation is yet another attempt to bring him down.
The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa's (Numsa) KwaZulu-Natal branch was the first organisation to come out in support of Vavi's claim that he is being framed. It said the rape allegation against Vavi was politically motivated.
"This latest rape allegation cannot be de-linked from the poisonous, malicious and well-calculated political offensive directed towards destroying comrade Vavi's political integrity and standing in society," Numsa regional secretary Mbuso Ngubane said in a statement. He said the union was "fully behind" Vavi.
The Azanian People's Organisation also expressed their concern over whether the allegations could be engineered within the tripartite alliance as a weapon to weaken Vavi in his stand against graft and maladministration in the country.
Interaction
Vavi, in a statement on Saturday, admitted that he had been having a relationship with the woman since late last year. He insisted that the sex was consensual. In a trail of text messages between Vavi and the woman, there seemed to be no signs of anger towards Vavi after the alleged incident in January.
The SMSes reveal that she had an HIV scare that she spoke to him about, and weeks later their interaction was back to being jovial. Around June, she alerted him of unknown people who had approached her and were coercing her to claim that Vavi hurt her.
The woman claims she was offered R1-million to confess and was given reassurance she would be protected. On June 11, she texted him: "I'm having sleepless nights because of this, people wanting me to say that you hurt me, wanting information from me. I do not think I want to work at Cosatu anymore … this is all too much for me. I can't, this is a sick world. Politics."
On the same day, her husband tweeted, "Zwelinzima you are a fucking dog". He later posted an article with the headline: "Married to a rapist" and he commented that this was disgusting.
Vavi's leadership
Cosatu, for the most part of the year, has been building a case to show their unhappiness with Vavi's leadership. The M&G last month reported that some of the leaders of the trade union federation were pushing for action to be taken against him for allegedly covering up a damning report by the Financial Services Board, which uncovered apparent cases of corruption, fraud and money laundering involving Cosatu's investment arm, Kopano ke Matla and Westside Financial Services.
Last week, Vavi was asked by his family to retire from public office following death threats that he received in a letter. He said he started getting the threats in 2010 when he received information that he would "go down" the same way as the former deputy minister of health, Dr Molefi Sefularo who died in a car accident.
He was also accused of having played a corrupt role in the sale of the Cosatu House, which he claimed was sold for R9-million less than its value.
Last week, Vavi reiterated to his enemies in the trade union federation that he best represents the interests of the working class, accusing them of abandoning its agenda to appease government, the ANC leadership and the South African Communist Party.
In a hard-hitting submission to the commission of inquiry established to investigate several allegations against him by leaders of Cosatu affiliates, Vavi accused Cosatu leaders – among others its president, Sdumo Dlamini; its deputy president, Zingisa Losi; the general secretary of the National Education, Health and Allied Workers' Union, Fikile Majola; and the general secretary of the National Union of Mineworkers, Frans Baleni – of showing right-wing tendencies by deviating from Cosatu resolutions.
Dlamini, Losi, Majola and Baleni have all testified against Vavi, suggesting that he was responsible for the "political rupture" within Cosatu. The rupture refers to the divisions and ideological differences that have beset the trade federation in the last few years.
Vavi has dismissed all the allegations against him.
