Category Archives: trade unions

Sunday Tribune: Building a left alliance remains critical – and challenging

Building a left alliance remains critical – and challenging, writes Imraan Buccus, Sunday Tribune 

YET again we have had a tumultuous political week. May Day in 2017 turned out to be the most significant May Day in South African history since 1986.

Firstly, Numsa, and its new federation, Saftu, celebrated the day in Durban with a march from Curries Fountain, where Cosatu was launched in 1985.

For the new federation to decide to show its strength in Durban, the heartland of Jacob Zuma’s remaining support, was a bold and important act. Continue reading →

All that Glitters is not Gold

9 May 2013

All that Glitters is not Gold

By an employee of the Tsogo Sun (Garden Court-Marine Parade)

Our sweat and all our hope that Labour Brokers will one day be banned from this democracy has vanished. We have all supported COSATU and millions of South Africans who have made this call to put an end to the Labour Brokers so as to save our exploited brother and sisters. People working under Labour Brokers are suffering incredible exploitation. We have no sense of security in the world. We are disrespected and humiliated every day.

We are employed by Progress CC in the Tsogo Sun formerly known as the Garden Court Holiday-Inn in Marine Parade on Durban’s beach front. Many of us have worked for more than seven, eight, nine and ten years without being registered with the Department of Labour or any Bargaining Council. There are more than fifty employees but only less than five are employed permanently. Here there is a constant employment as constant firing is an order of the day. We earn R6 per room and are not paid per hour. There is no starting time and therefore no finishing time. We have to work overtime all the time but we are never paid for this time. There is no tea break or lunch hour. It is therefore taken as a crime to eat any time when you are hungry. We are not allowed to eat company food as this constitutes a dismissible crime.

Continue reading →

The New Age: Workers’ Power Thrives On Unity

http://thinkingafricarhodesuniversity.blogspot.com/2013/01/workers-power-thrives-on-unity.html

Workers’ Power Thrives On Unity

by Steven Friedman

The Durban strikes of 1973 empowered workers and helped destroy apartheid.

This month 40 years ago, South Africa learned an important truth which shaped our future – that people without power can challenge those who have it, but only if they act together.

The lesson was taught by the Durban strikes of 1973; they began a process which shifted power to working people and played an important role in defeating apartheid.

First, the strikes triggered the formation of unions which fought long battles with a few employers to win the right to negotiate. These unions became the core of the Federation of SA Trade Unions which combined with other unions to form Cosatu in the mid-1980s. So they were, in a sense, the beginning of today’s union movement. Continue reading →

Lindela ‘Mashumi’ Figlan

Lindela 'Mashumi' Figlan

Lindela Figlan was born on the 27th of December 1970 in J.B. Location in Flagstaff in Pondoland in what was then the Transkei bantustan.

His mother was from the Radebe family and she kept the home. His father was secretary of the congress that went into revolt on Ngquza Hill in 1960. More than 4 000 men occupied Ngquza Hill. They were determined to fight for their land and for their dignity. The apartheid state sent in the military and there was a massacre. The courage of the men on Ngquza Hill is always remembered in Pondoland today. The songs from that struggle, like 'Asiyifuni idompas', are still sung today. When Lindela was a young boy the police used to come to their home from time to time, kick in the door and kidnap his father. Sometimes they would take him to a place known as Betani where they would force him to dig potatoes with his hands saying that they did not want to risk damaging their tools. When he came home his fingernails would be red.

Continue reading →

City Press: Liberation betrayed by bloodshed

http://www.citypress.co.za/Opinions/Liberation-betrayed-by-bloodshed-20120825

Liberation betrayed by bloodshed

The tragedy at Marikana reflects the loss of the vision of liberation and the onset of repression by default, argues Njabulo S Ndebele

On the evening of Thursday, August 16, in Johannesburg, I returned to my hotel for a well-deserved rest.

I would turn on the TV, watch the news and then settle back to enjoy yet another episode of Isidingo.

But the evening I imagined was not to be. As the TV flickered to life, a newsreader introduced a breaking news item, and I knew immediately what was being replayed before me.

Police officers opened fire, and dust rose as people in the line of fire collapsed. Continue reading →