Cosatu Eastern Cape Strike Call

Cosatu Eastern Cape is finalising its mobilisation working with its affiliates for the upcoming one-day national strike , 7th October . 

This is in response to many challenges facing workers within our Province and across the world. Workers still continue to work under appalling and unhealthy and unsafe working conditions in both public and private sectors. In our Province ,there are still companies that are using labour brokers and refusing even to comply with the latest so called regulations by government. Farm workers are worse off as they are not treated as human beings with their rights being violated on a daily basis by the farmers.

We will have a march on the 7th October , gathering at North End stadium in Buffalo City Metro at 1000 and proceed to the Department of Labour to hand over our memorandum of demands to both Border Kei Chamber of Business and the
Department of Labour Management. 

The following will be amongst the list of our demands:

1. An immediate stoppage of outsourcing by all Provincial Departments

2. An end to the use of private lawyers on ordinary disciplinary cases by the Provincial government
3. Payment of all outstanding service benefits to workers
4. Filling of all vacant funded posts
5. Demand the total banning of labour brokers
6. Demand the Provincial Government to put an end to the planned building of E-toll gates on the wild coast road
7. Demand compliance with Occupational Health & Safety Standards in all workplaces
8. Fight for the scrapping of the Taxation Amendment Law
9. Demand the implementation of NHI
10. Demand the implementation of Free Education.

Issued by COSATU Eastern Cape

Support Swaziland Strikers

Riot police in Swaziland are under fire for using rubber bullets and teargas against striking workers. A strike at Swaziland Plantation has entered its second month amid clashes between police and workers.

Swaziland Agriculture and Plantations Workers Union (SAPWU) Chairperson Sibusiso Masuku told the Swazi Observer newspaper the police had taken a violent stance against the workers. Masuku explained, 'The riot police are just pawns used by the Plantation Forest Company administration to fight against us, we feel safer when they are not present as we do not understand their way of thinking.' 

In June 2015, Swaziland was listed as one of the top ten worst countries in the world for workers' rights. It was grouped alongside some of the worst human rights violators on the planet, including Belarus, China, Colombia, Egypt, Guatemala, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Wildcat in Kleinkopje

Workers have downed tools at a mine operated by Anglo American’s South African coal unit, Kleinkopje, a union and the company said. The National Union of Mineworkers said in a statement that its members were calling for the removal of the mine’s general manager, whom it said had “made lots of changes without consulting” the union. NUM spokesman Livhuwani Mammburu said 421 of its members were involved in the strike,

A spokesman for Anglo American said the strike started on Tuesday and was regarded by the company as a wildcat action because the workers had not gone through the proper channels before calling the stoppage at the mine east of Johannesburg.

The move comes ahead of wage talks in South Africa’s coal, gold and diamond sectors expected to begin next month. In March, the NUM said it may seek pay hikes of up to 100% for its lowest paid members, which currently make 6,000 rand ($491) a month in gold, 7,000 rand in coal and 9,000 rand in the diamond sector. Gold wage agreements expire at the end of June and the industry executives have repeatedly said they cannot afford big increases as they, once again, are dealing with slumping prices, power constraints and falling grades in the world's deepest mines.

AMCU's Strike

Next week the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union will move to strike at two of the world's top three platinum producers. Their members are demanding a "living wage," which would imply a doubling of salaries,12,500 rand ($1,200) minimum monthly wage.

"That 12,500 is nothing compared to these profits. Why do they invest this profit in London instead of investing back to where the workers are?" said AMCU president Joseph Mathunjwa.

Last week, Thebe Maswabi, who chairs Amcu’s branch at Anglo American Platinum, rallied workers to break away from Amcu. Mr Maswabi was particularly scathing about Amcu’s leader, Joseph Mathunjwa, whom he accused of enriching himself at the expense of workers. Mathunjwa has managed through loans to exercise control over many people, even senior managers, according to people close to his dealings. Yet, they describe him as a capitalist at heart, who is forever seeking money-making opportunities. Critics say, for example, that he will sometimes drive an agenda — such as pension fund membership — because there are brokerage fees to be gained. Mathunjwa is described as a smooth talker who comes across as sincere and a supporter of capitalist practices. “In this manner, he normally wins the trust and support of managers, sometimes to their own detriment,” they said.

Amcu’s achilles tendon — its poor organisational ability — has opened the door for worker committees seeking to take advantage of the gaps. If Amcu is now not delivering as these workers expected, then the union will be rejected. And these workers are unlikely to want to revert to NUM, which would leave the gap open for a new union.

Said one labour analyst: “It would not be surprising if the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) takes advantage of this situation, and forms its own union in opposition to the Amcu and the NUM. The EFF is very active in the area, particularly among the unemployed and the youth,”

From here

Ongoing Strikes In South Africa Over Wages And Working Conditions

Tens of thousands of South African construction and airport workers have gone on strike over wages and working conditions.

On Monday, some 90,000 construction workers in the mining industry stopped work to demand a 13 percent pay increase.

On the same day, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) issued a statement saying, “They cannot ... plead poverty, and must share their super-profits with workers who risk life and limb every day in one of the most dangerous working environments.”

Also, on Monday, South African Transport and Allied Workers' Union spokesman Vincent Masoga issued a statement saying 1,300 aircraft maintenance technicians went on strike to demand a 12 percent wage increase.

South Africa's mining sector has been paralyzed by a series of wildcat strikes over miners' low pay since August, 2012. Dozens of people have so far been killed in the strike-related violence.

In February 2013, South African security guards shot dead mineworkers outside Amplats Siphumelele mine in the northwestern city of Rustenburg following a clash between rival union factions.

South Africa’s mining sector represents 6 percent of the country’s total Gross Domestic Product (GDP), with having a labor force of more than half a million workers. It also generates 60 percent of total export revenues.

In June, South African President Jacob Zuma called for dialogue among all stakeholders in the mining sector, saying, “All stakeholders, government, management in the mining sector, trade union movement in particular should talk and find a way to deal with this matter.”

The South African president went on to say that the stakeholders have the capacity to discuss and agree about the problems, including strikes and deadly clashes faced by the mining industry.

From here

The farm workers fight

Unions and charities supporting the Western Cape's 500,000 farmworkers say pay and conditions are so bad that South African wines, grapes and Granny Smith apples have called for a boycott of them. Of the Western Cape's fruit production, 58% is exported and, in Britain, one of the main importers is Tesco. For world socialists those calls to boycott South African produce is deja vu of the earlier anti-apartheid campaigns. This may help in this particular case but will not lessen the class struggle in South Africa.

The farmers' "vindictive" response to the latest two-week strike in the £850m-a-year fruit and wine sector is sacking workers by the truck-load.

South African farmworkers  called off the latest round of a strike for a daily wage of 150 rands (£10.65), their union said but warned of a new flare-up in the Western Cape.  Portia Adams, a spokeswoman for the employers' organisation Agri SA, said many farms had continued to operate using non-unionised labour from outside the farming areas.

 "The government should be forcing the farmers to the table but it is not," said Nosey Pieterse, secretary general of the Black Workers' Agricultural Sector Union, (Bawusa). "Our only weapon left is for the foreign retailers to pledge that unless the conditions are addressed, they will no longer import South African products." The government has been silent on the issue, tacitly pointing to ongoing annual minimum wage talks. Pieterse, a lifelong activist for farmworkers' rights, said: "The farmers are intransigent, vengeful and arrogant. Yet they are the beneficiaries of post-apartheid South Africa. In the first 10 years of democracy, the wine industry grew tenfold, from 20m litres output before 1994 to 220m litres. The farmworkers' conditions went the other way. Tenure rights laws were not accepted by the farmers. More than 1  million farmworkers were evicted. They remain slaves on the land of their birth."

 Most farmworkers are not unionised, many are illiterate and face the risk of eviction because they live on their employers' properties.Poorly enforced labour rights and tenancy laws as well as the pitifully low statutory minimum daily wage in the sector – 69.39 rands (£4.92) – perpetuate a culture of paternalism. To go on strike, workers have to stand up to employer.  A 2011 report by Human Rights Watch found widespread exposure to pesticides, lack of access to drinking water or sanitation, and failure to pay sick leave. While the system of dop – payment in alcohol – has largely been abolished, the Western Cape still has the highest rates in the world of foetal alcohol syndrome.

Grapes of Wrath

Striking farm workers in South Africa's biggest table grape-growing region set fire to more than 30 hectares of vineyards to protest against what they call "hunger wages". They are demanding R150 per day. They claim the government only paid attention when the vineyards started to burn.

"The wages here are too small, R72 (£5) a day. You cannot buy anything with that money," strike organiser Shaun Janca said. "The money that they pay us is nothing. We work our whole lives but still we have nothing. We are working for what? For what?"

"The labourers are working for a minimum wage of R69.39 per day. Per week it is R346.95 a week and the workers can't work for that amount. They say it is a 'hunger wage' " activist and local labour advisor Petrus Brink said. "The poor people and the workers are getting poorer. They can't support their families and can't take care of their children. That is why they are becoming so aggressive, because the R346.95 is not even enough for them to survive for a week,"

"People are hungry, they are frustrated and they are tired. They want to work but they want to see some improvement in their working conditions," said Braam Hanekom, chairman of People Against Suffering Oppression and Poverty (Passop)

Many of the workers come in to do seasonal work from areas such as the Eastern Cape, Zimbabwe, Mozambique and even Somalia. "This creates a condition where permanent workers feel that their employment is under threat - that they might lose their permanent jobs. The grapes and citrus farmed in the area are intended for the export market. "The farmers make large sums of profit, but then there is no return for the workers. The farm owners reason they don't have to bargain for farm labour because there is already a pool of cheap labour, and so if the permanent workers from the Western Cape don't want to work for that amount, the farmers do have access to another labour market," Brink said. With a cheaper migrant labour force prepared to live in squatter camps, farmers have been less inclined to offer housing, education or other social amenities.

 A report issued by Human Rights Watch in August 2011 Ripe with Abuse detailed a litany of rights abuses practiced by some local farmers.  It documented evidence of housing on farms unfit for living; labourers being exposed to fertilisers and pesticides without the proper safety equipment; a lack of access to water while working in dehydrating conditions; the lack of toilet facilities for workers; and the undue pressure put on workers to stop them from joining unions. It also detailed threats of evictions made against residents who had stayed on farms for long periods of time.

We told you so

 A massacre by South African police left 34 striking workers dead and 78 wounded. A T-shirt worn by a protest rally organiser seemed to offer a explanation, stating: "Fuck capitalism.". It was the promise of a militant union that sparked violence at Marikana, where the ANC-aligned National Union of Mineworkers has been losing support. The 360,000-member National Union of Mineworkers leader, Cyril Ramaphosa sits on the board of Lonmin, which owns the platinium mine where the shootings occurred. The NUM has lost all credibility. Its already well-paid secretary, Baleni, was awarded a salary increase of more than 40% last year and his total salary package is just more than R105 000 a month.The union has accepted wage settlements that tied workers into years of meagre increases. At the Lonmin mines its membership has declined from 66% of workers to 49%. "Lonmin treat us like dogs," said Thembelani Khonto. "When you're underground, it's like you're a slave and they don't know you. But on the surface people who don't do anything in offices are earning more than us."

Dissident and expelled union activists started a new union, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union. The AMCU placed a pay demand for rock drillers (who are the core of this strike and do the hardest work underground). The union's support in the Lonmin mines shot up to 19% by last month, and it embarked on an illegal strike to force its pay demand. The AMCU is also organising among poor workers and their shack settlement communities, which have become no-go zones for police. For these settlements, this is a strike against the state and the haves, not just a union matter.

Socialist Banner in many previous posts have exposed the ANC of continuing the apartheid-era exploitation of the working class and sadly concludes that the latest bloody episode in South Africa's class war vindicates our position.  The Sowetan newspaper in an editorial also questioned what has changed since 1994. "It has happened in this country before where the apartheid regime treated black people like objects. It is continuing in a different guise now."

While workers bleed the capitalists response is predictable. World platinum prices rise and Lonmin shares slump

Union Lessons

More than 200,000 Kenyan teachers went on strike Tuesday to protest the diversion of government funds meant to hire more teachers and ease classroom overcrowding. The money has instead gone to the ministry of defense, whose spending is not publicly scrutinized.

"Children of this country are not enjoying equal opportunities," Wilson Sossion, who heads the Kenya National Union of Teachers said. "This is the struggle. We are not doing it this time around for a salary increment. We are doing it for the poor child of this country and for the poor parent of this country."

The union wants the government to give full-time jobs to 18,000 teachers hired on temporary contracts and hire an additional 9,040 teachers. Some 79,000 teachers are needed to reach the internationally recommended teacher to student ratio of one teacher to 35 students. Kenya's public schools see an average of 50 students for every teacher, though some classes have only one teacher for 100 pupils. The union projects a shortfall of 115,000 teachers in the next couple of years as the population increases.

Nearly 10 percent of 13-year-old Kenyan students cannot complete a math problem meant for 7-year-olds, according to research done earlier this year by Uwezo, a pressure group that aims to improve literacy among children in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania. Britain suspended payments to the Kenyan government intended to help poor schoolchildren after $45 million in international donor money went missing.

Beyond the strikes

One cannot but notice some of the unobtrusive ways that capitalists maintain control of wealth and the instruments they use to protect wealth. Maintenance of an economic system that ensures a pool of unemployed people serves as a control mechanism to keep workers in check as they could easily be replaced by those hungry for a job, under any condition. Studies show that the bare minimum working conditions, as legally required, seem to have become the norm, with few companies even considering raising the standard. The pressure to maintain profit seems to drive cost saving in this regard.

Agreements between employers and workers have been reached in the metal and steel industry, petroleum sector and most recently with the 200,000 gold miners that also went on strike. Not all strikes and negotiations have ended. At the time of writing, union representatives of platinum miners were still in talks with employers, while negotiations between Eskom and the union representing its workers remain protracted. The debate about how low wages need to go in the clothing industry continues.Often the structuring (or lack thereof) of wage deals under tremendous pressure ends up defeating the aims of workers. A deal often sounds as if it is a good compromise until the finer details come to light much later. A case in point is Pick n Pay Stores Ltd. Last year, workers made the sacrifice and went on a protracted strike in order to force the hand of management that made a commitment to improve on minimum wages over a three-year period, but subsequently also announced their intention to retrench over 3 000 workers in August 2011. In this case management can argue that they're still honouring the wage increase deal when they give increases to those who survive the chop, as increases are due in August as per the agreement, but many others face joblessness and the harsh circumstances that come with it. Walmart's presence (i.e. international competition) in South Africa is the latest in a range of reasons companies like Pick n Pay present as to why they can't give in to workers' wage demands or why layoffs are necessary. The high minimum wage, inflation, the recession, the cost of transport and unrealistic worker rights are some of the other reasons often heard.

According to the Labour Research Service Pick n Pay is the second largest retailer of food, clothing and general merchandise in South Africa and one of the largest in Africa with 869 stores. The Group currently employs over 49 000 people and generates an annual turnover of 52 billion Rand. Despite the recession from which the country is slowly recovering, Pick n Pay's financial report for the 2011 year-end reflected more revenue from sales than it was able to achieve between 2008 and 2011. LRS reports that dividends paid to Pick n Pay directors have increased each year throughout these trying economic times, except for the 2011 year end. It is projected that Pick n Pay will grow to 935 stores by the end of 2011 and 1 039 by 2012. These numbers tell the story of growth in the company. However, staff numbers are not commensurate with this expansion. Employment figures peaked in 2008 with 54 700 people and has declined since and will drop significantly if proposed retrenchments are implemented this month. This constant decline in employment figures during the growth in sales between 2008 and 2011 surely has to be a factor in explaining the increasing dividend payouts to directors. Less staff would mean that existing staff members have to work harder and longer or that casual workers, more vulnerable to exploitation, are used to fill gaps. This strategy has an impact on society in general as it contributes to maintaining poverty by failing to provide adequately for workers' needs. It represents a shocking indictment on Pick n Pay and other companies that employ similar methods while the country faces an urgent crisis of unemployment. Worse still, the wage gap between those at the top and those at the bottom exposes a gaping inequality. The salary of Pick n Pay CEO, Nick Badminton, is currently estimated at R3 544 500 for 2011, excluding perks and the directors earn R2 107 800 on average for 2011. The average worker at Pick n Pay earns R45 600 per annum. It would take such a worker 78 years to earn what the CEO will make this year.

The Ackerman family, which retains a controlling interest in Pick n Pay, pride themselves on their corporate social investment (CSI) work. Yet, CSI only works because of the inequity that business practices such as those described above generate in society. The handouts allow dynasties such as the Ackermans to maintain a positive image despite the treatment of workers in their core business.

The protection of profit margins is an acceptable defence in our society. Everyone seems to accept the unspoken principal that the profit must not be touched. However, just how much profit is sufficient is not up for discussion or negotiation. Strike action is always at great personal and financial cost to workers as strikes occur on a no-work no-pay basis. Yet to the public, inconvenienced by the strike, the industry's excuses may sound reasonable and union leaders may seem stubborn, holding out for a bigger increase than companies say they can afford.

Our solutions to the economic morass we find taking hold of society have to evolve from a new paradigm that considers economic activity as part of a whole system which has other components such as human material and spiritual needs. Once these needs take supremacy over profits and wages, production will come to have new meaning.

Adapted from Charlene Houston
at http://allafrica.com/stories/201108041082.html

Post-apartheid class struggle

Many wonder if the Arab Spring will reach Africa, but what people should really be watching is the spread of strikes across the continent in response to rising costs, inequality, and government dissatisfaction. Problems like rising food and fuel costs, economic inequality, and dissatisfaction with government taxes and other policies are driving workers to shut down businesses and take to the streets. Strikes in Uganda by traders and taxi drivers (teachers have since threatened to strike as well). Nigerian workers are preparing a national strike over a non-implemented minimum wage increase ( although a last-minute promise by governors to pay the wage may avert the strike.)

South Africa is also facing major strikes.

According to the Naledi Research Paper on the Living Wage, presented to the Cosatu central committee last month, the top 10% of earners receive about 94 times more than the bottom 10%. The poorest 10% share R1.1bn between them while the richest 10% share R381bn, 51% of the total.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is being calculated does not accurately reflect the full cost of living faced by workers.

“The costs attributed to transportation, healthcare and administered prices to items such as electricity and food are understated in terms of their weighting in the CPI calculation,” said Karl Cloete, deputy general secretary of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa).not taking into account administered price increases, which were affecting workers heavily. He said that for the past five years, there has been serious price increases on essential services which had heavily affected the buying power of ordinary workers.

John Appolis, national policy coordinator at the Chemical, Energy, Paper, Printing, Wood and Allied Workers Union, said the cost of living had been on the increase and the inflation rate failed to reflect this reality. “It is not a true reflection of the living experience by our members. Most of the CPI baskets are skewed, underrated and understated,” he said. According to Appolis, CPI is therefore a weak measure of how much workers spend on ensuring their families are able to survive, and should not be used as a proxy of any kind.“Our members are productive every day and we have spent time explaining that to the public. But in return, they get paid peanuts while executive directors are rewarded with huge salaries. What are those executives doing? They come and check balance sheets and go play golf the whole day and at the end cream up all the wealth. We don’t buy the argument that our members are not productive,” said Appolis.

Lesiba Seshoka, spokesperson of the National Union of Mineworkers said “The majority of our members in the mines are forced to walk distances to reach their places of work. They are not being provided with transport, live in shacks without electricity.”

Numsa’s general secretary, Irvin Jim, said “South Africa is the most unequal country in the world in terms of income, and the most concrete way to address this inequality is to close the wage gap...It is not true that capital will substantially increase employment if wages are set at a lower rate.”

Africa's Chinese strikers

Labor conflicts involving overseas Chinese workers have become more frequent in recent years due to the increasing flow of Chinese nationals to foreign labor markets .

Two Chinese workers were killed and four were injured when the strikers, reported to number between 100 and 200, confronted Equatorial Guinean security forces who intervened when the protesters tried to stop other Chinese colleagues from working. Equatorial Guinea's government has imposed a news blackout on the incident and the small country's tightly controlled media have made no mention of it. Government ministers reached by telephone by Reuters declined to answer questions about it.
China has withdrawn more than 400 of its workers from Equatorial Guinea
A senior government official said Equatorial Guinea's authorities had asked China to withdraw the workers involved in the labour dispute.

"We do not want strikes in our country. We asked the Chinese ambassador ... to find other workers," the official said.

China invests heavily in development projects in resource-rich African countries. Large oil and gas deposits were discovered in Equatorial Guinea in the mid-1990s and in 2004 the country was listed as the world's fastest-growing economy, though it ranks near the bottom of a UN human development index.

Swazi Strikes

A bloody week of the worst labour strife in a decade has exposed cracks in the Swazi government's poverty-alleviation plan of creating thousands of low-paying jobs by promoting a textile industry.

In the strike action, which began on 3 March, workers participating in peaceful marches to demand better salaries have been teargassed and beaten by police . Local media reported that the Swaziland police carried out unprovoked attacks on peaceful marchers on the first day of the strike. Several injuries were reported after riot police shot teargas into a line of marchers . On 5 March, several marchers were beaten and teargassed after vandals sealed the lock on the gate of a textile factory with glue. Uncertain of the culprits' identities, the police randomly struck at marchers, some of whom had to be hospitalised.

Textiles have become a key player in Swaziland's otherwise moribund manufacturing sector, which saw many of its multinational companies relocate to South Africa when apartheid ended in 1994 . Swaziland's textile industry is dominated by garment-making factories owned by Taiwanese immigrants who came to Swaziland in 2000/02 to take advantage of preferential trade conditions with the US under the African Growth and Opportunity Act . The country is one of the few that has diplomatic ties with Taiwan and does not recognise the People's Republic of China. Taiwan returned the favour by encouraging its garment-makers to invest in Swaziland.
In turn, the Swazi government has offered tax holidays to incoming firms, and constructed factory shells that are sometimes leased for free of charge to large employers.

Low wages and "cultural conflicts" bedevilled labour relations from the outset, but came to a head when a strike vote was approved by 30 percent of the nation's 16,000 Swaziland Manufacturing and Allied Workers Union members . The union seeks to raise wages by 12 percent.

"My take-home pay is R300 (about US$38) a fortnight," said Cynthia Ndwandwe, a mother of five employed by an Asian-owned garment factory. "I can no longer afford to buy bread."

"Textile workers are forced to live on mediocre salaries," said Fakudze , president of SMAWU . "How can breadwinners be expected to provide for their families on just R600 ($77) a month?"

Class First and Foremost

In Nigeria unions are angry at a series of measures pushed though in the last days of the presidency of Olusegun Obasanjo, who stepped down last month. The price of petrol was increased from 65 naira (51 US cents) a litre to 75 naira (The government has now reportedly offered to reduce this to 70 naira ). Transport fares have doubled in some areas following the fuel price hike.

Impoverished Nigerians see cheap fuel as one of the few benefits they derive from a corrupt state. Despite nearly 40 years of oil production that has brought the government hundreds of billions of dollars, most Nigerians live in poverty. A fifth of all of Nigeria's children die before the age of five .While Nigeria is one of the world's biggest oil producers, virtually all of its refined fuel is re-imported from overseas at great cost. GNP per capita is actually lower than it was on the achievement of Independence in 1960.

Nigeria's powerful labor unions launched a general strike Wednesday to protest government price hikes, leaving many schools and banks shuttered and normally bustling streets quieter in Africa's oil giant. The unions, including Nigerian workers in the oil industry, rejected concessions by new President Umaru Yar'Adua's government aimed at averting the action and said Wednesday the work stoppage was under way.

It is Not Colour - It is Class

On June 1st South African public sector workers staged the largest strike since apartheid . It involves 17 unions, including teachers, nurses and other civil servants. The government has mobilised army medics as strikebreakers in hospitals. Soldiers are also doing the work of non-medical hospital staff, including porters, cleaners and cooks. The government secured court orders to widen the legal definition of “essential workers” so as to deny around 300,000 of the country’s more than 1 million public servants the right to strike. Many nurses, doctors and health workers have defied the orders.

The government sacked 638 health workers who had not returned to work.

Thulas Nxesi, general secretary of the 220,000-strong South African Democratic Teachers Union, told workers at the June 13 Johannesburg rally, “Any injury to one is an injury to all. Dismiss one, dismiss all!”

A report published by the South African Institute of Race Relations demonstrated that the living conditions for millions of South Africans have worsened since the ending of apartheid 13 years ago. Official unemployment currently stands at 26 percent, but the real figure is 41 percent—double what it was 10 years ago. Millions of workers earn less than US$150 a month, and 4 million people are living in conditions of extreme poverty, defined as less than US$1 a day.

President Thabo Mbeki gets a 57,3% pay rise, taking his total package from R1,1-million to R1,8-million annually. Members of Parliament receive a total of R650,000 annually.

Yet a miserable 6% wage increase originally offered to public sector workers .

Latest News :-

The police union Popcru and the South African Police Service are in a legal battle on whether the police and correctional services personnel may join the strike.

Zimbabwe Workers Struggle

Zimbabwe workers win court case , face violence

A court has dismissed charges against three top officers of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU), ruling on March 29 that the government failed to present evidence proving the
union federation had violated "exchange control" regulations to affect the market. ZCTU secretary-general Wellington Chibebe, Elijah Mutemeri and Vimbai Mushongera were involved in an attempt to organize workers in the informal sector by founding a new organization, the Zimbabwe Chamber of Informal Economy Associations (ZCIEA). The Zimbabwean police raided its office in 2005.

Informal workers are one of the most widespread but precarious sectors of the Zimbabwean economy. Through the creation of the ZCIEA, the ZCTU had sought to represent these often voiceless workers. Reportedly, the government saw the new organization as a potential rival political party, fomented by the British-based Commonwealth Council of Trade Unions. The British government is one of Zimbabwe’s most outspoken critics in the European Union and Commonwealth and its strong links to Zimbabwe’s labor movement are well known.

The inability of Zimbabwe’s government to prove its case in court and the court’s decision to stand by the law instead of the government’s desire to convict its opposition may signal a weakening of the government’s authority.

In a recent police report, the Zimbabwean police also complain about the judiciary’s independence and unwillingness to support the government’s repression of the opposition. The police has "no support from the judiciary who continue to either release accused persons on either free or make them pay very small bail, allowing them to go out and continue with their illegal activities," according to the report.

Police violence dogs "Stay-Away"

Zimbabwe’s government and paramilitary supporters used threats,intimidation, violence, kidnapping and murder to fight the April 3rd and 4th stay-away general strike called by the Zimbabwean trade union congress. Unknown assailants kidnapped one teachers’ union officer who remains missing, while others beat a television cameraman to death. The government is now demanding that all companies that did close their doors justify their actions in writing.

Preliminary reports say that the stay-away was not as successful as the opposition had hoped for. However, the ZCTU points out that, considering the widespread intimidation that prevailed, the level of participation in the action was impressive.

President Robert Mugabe, once hailed as the country’s liberator from colonialism, has ruled Zimbabwe since 1980. It is now in an economic and political tailspin. Mugabe blames Zimbabwe’s current crisis on his domestic opposition and on foreign interference. Despite the dire situation, the ruling party has already confirmed Mugabe as its presidential candidate for the 2008 elections.

An opposition movement for change formed in 1999, but has failed so far to mobilize enough popular support to force Mugabe out of power. Its activists have faced systematic police harassment and brutality.

May 2007 issue of the Industrial Worker , journal of the Industrial Workers of the World