A controversial decision by Cosatu to establish election “war rooms” to support the ANC before the crucial 2024 national and provincial elections has received a lukewarm response from the labour federation’s largest affiliates.
The decision to support the ANC was taken during Cosatu’s central executive committee meeting last week, at which the federation, which has a membership of about 1.6-million, called on workers to ensure a decisive victory for the embattled ANC at the polls.
The ANC’s support is expected to dip below 50% for the first time since 1994. The party and its allies are going all out to avoid this scenario.
But a union leader, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: “This thing [setting up war rooms] is nonsensical. You can’t expect to take workers’ money to support a political party that has not been honest with workers. Workers are going to be very angry if we do that.
“Trade unions are financially stretched…. Instead of dealing with workers’ issues, why should we be directing their money to a political party? This decision is a no-no,” he said.
The national spokesperson of the SA Municipal Workers Union (Samwu), Papikie Mohale, said the union was still to establish a war room.
National Union of Mineworkers media officer Luphert Chilwane said the matter was still under discussion.
SA Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) national spokesperson Nomusa Cembi refused to comment, while the deputy general secretary of the Democratic Nursing Organisation of SA (Denosa), Khaya Sodidi, did not respond to a request for comment.
The national spokesperson of the Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru), Richard Mamabolo, said the union’s national executive committee would meet next week, when they will “put all those matters into context and establish different roles. Thus far, no decision has been taken about the exact roles we will be allocating among ourselves.”
Taking money
Labour analyst and DA MP Michael Bagraim said Cosatu had been spending workers’ money on the ANC in every election.
“They have been using workers’ resources, staff and machinery to help the ANC, so effectively … they are taking workers’ monies and using it for political ends, which is wrong,” Bagraim said.
“It’s also immoral because workers … have been fighting with the ANC for the past five years. Now Cosatu … says unions must support the ANC because they know some of the [Cosatu] leadership will take up positions in the ANC national executive committee and in cabinet. It almost borders on bribery,” he said.
Bagraim accused Cosatu of “abusing its members and their resources” for political ends.
Nelson Mandela University political analyst Prof Ntsikelelo Breakfast said workers were disillusioned with the Ramaphosa administration and Cosatu’s call for its affiliates to set up war rooms could further “widen divisions within the federation”.
“Cosatu initially sold Ramaphosa as worker-friendly, but it turned out that he is business-friendly. Workers were left angered when Ramaphosa said it is not the role of government to create jobs.
“The ANC is contested terrain. The working class had too much grip on power during the first term of the Zuma administration ... [but] not so under Ramaphosa,” said Breakfast.
While Cosatu had always supported the ANC during elections since SA’s first democratic elections in 1994, relations between the governing party and the labour federation came under strain over the years, primarily because of the ANC’s poor performance in government and its lackadaisical approach to dealing with service delivery, corruption and malfeasance in the public service.
Unjustifiably enriched
Workers were also angry at the ANC-led government after it refused to implement the last leg of a three-year wage agreement, signed at the public service co-ordinating bargaining council in 2018, citing a lack of funds.
The Constitutional Court ruled in February 2022 that the government could back out of the wage deal since unions were “unjustifiably enriched” from the “impugned collective agreement”.
This led to Cosatu refusing to endorse President Cyril Ramaphosa’s bid for re-election as ANC leader at the party’s national congress in December 2022.
Earlier in September 2022, at Cosatu’s national congress in Midrand, Johannesburg, Cosatu’s largest affiliates — including the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union (Nehawu), Popcru, Samwu and Denosa — called for the labour federation to immediately dump the ANC and support the SACP in the 2024 elections.
The four unions, accounting for more than 600,000 of Cosatu’s membership, accused the governing party of undermining workers and failing to implement alliance programmes.
Nehawu broke ranks with the unions when it resolved in December 2023 to use its structures to campaign for an “outright majority victory” for the ANC.
On Monday, Nehawu national spokesperson Lwazi Nkolonzi refused to comment on the establishment of a war room, saying this was an internal matter.
Cosatu general secretary Solly Phetoe said as part of the war room efforts, affiliated unions were working “flat out, across workplaces and communities” to mobilise support for the ANC, which is beset by operational, financial, administrative and financial challenges.
Cosatu acting national spokesperson Matthew Parks told Business Day on Monday: “We’ve established war rooms at the federation nationally, provincially and at locals across the country. Affiliates also have their own equivalent war rooms.”
The war rooms included Cosatu’s national, provincial and local leaderships, as well as “thousands of shop stewards”.
“We’re continuing to fundraise as our campaigns are ongoing and will continue up to election day. We use traditional communications [such as] posters and pamphlets, as well as modern tools of trade. Our most important tools are members’ meetings at workplaces across the country,” Parks said.
The war rooms had received positive feedback from workers and “they are excited by the elections and intend on coming out in their numbers on election day”.
“The elections will be the most contested since 1994, but we are confident that workers will vote in large numbers in support of the ANC and that the ANC will emerge victorious nationally and across the provinces on election day,” he said.
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