Tag: Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU)

There is a rare opportunity to right a lot of South Africa’s wrongs in one go. Corruption and unemployment are two major roadblocks. Permit me to explain how they can be simultaneously addressed within the current administration. I suggest an amnesty largely on the African National Congress (ANC’s) past wrongdoing in office in return for liberalisation of labour laws. This may be for a bit further down the line.

Gargantuan and tyrannical unions like the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU), South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU), and National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) have leveraged their power, numbers, money, and capacity to threaten violence, and in so doing hold the economy hostage.

With its impressive tradition of left politics, South Africa was the hope of the world. At the heart of post-apartheid politics was a revolutionary nationalist ANC, the oldest Communist Party in Africa, the SACP, and one of the most militant labour union federations in the world, COSATU.

Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) General Secretary Bheki Ntshalintshali’s thought-provoking, in-depth piece advocating the ostensible strengths of the government's localisation plans refers ('Ideologues do the jobless a disservice by turning localisation into a swearword', January 9).

Lockdown rendered many things impossible, among them the ability for unions to 'show up' for their members in what has traditionally been the status quo for negotiation in South Africa: the organised strike. In many countries across the globe and particularly in South Africa, the ability to organise a strike is where a union best demonstrates its strength.

Those of us who operate in a wide range of workplaces - across all sectors and industries - will have noticed a sea change in the volume and nature of collective industrial action. Work stoppages, illegal strikes, go-slows and massive amounts of peer-to-peer intimidation amongst employee's, especially unionised workers, have increased.

Read our exclusive cover story titled WORKPLACE POLITICISATION - A SERIOUS THREAT TO LABOUR STABILITY & THE PEACE OBLIGATION? by Dr Ivor Blumenthal, CEO, ArkKonsult, as well a host of other topical management articles written by professionals, consultants and academics in the April/May 2021 edition of BusinessBrief.

The DTI has failed business in exchange for being BBBEE politically correct! The Department of Trade and Industry have shown an astonishing naivete at best and total disregard at worst for business sustainability, in not extending current BBBEE certificates for at least a year, because of COVID-19.

Blame "Capital Monopoly" if you must, but blame "White Monopoly Capital" at your peril. The South African Government's strategy, when dealing with the economic fallout, has been to set itself off against Business squarely, being the demon in society, while characterising Government as the White Knight out to protect society against the ravages of bad Business.

Sparking an immediate celebration in the rand and bond markets, the 2020 Budget Speech ticked all the right boxes for markets, depicting a government that is reform-minded and ready to show its muscles.