Union federation Cosatu has stepped back from the political fracas between its long-time allies, the ANC and SA Communist Party (SACP).
This was clear from the tone of the federation’s central committee meeting this week, where it resisted internal and external pressure to pick a side.
The SACP is forging ahead with its resolution to contest elections on its own in the 2026 or 2027 local poll, taking on the ANC as a political opponent for the first time in three decades.
The SACP will be disappointed at the outcome as it has anticipated relying heavily on Cosatu resources to help with its campaign from their shared office space in Cosatu House in Braamfontein.
But there is wisdom in Cosatu’s approach. Some of its largest affiliates — such as the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union and police union Popcru — have been agitating for the federation to throw its weight and campaign muscle behind the SACP, while teacher union Sadtu — the largest union in the federation — favours retaining the status quo.
It has become apparent that picking a side would split the federation and possibly threaten its survival.
Numsa’s ghost looms: the perils of internal splits
Cosatu has been here before. Back in December 2013 its largest affiliate at the time, the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa), took a historic — and at the time unthinkable — decision. Long disillusioned by former president Jacob Zuma’s handling of the economy, Numsa resolved to withhold its support for the ANC in the 2014 general election.
The decision at the Birchwood Conference Centre in Boksburg, the same venue where Cosatu held its central committee this week, had far-reaching ramifications both politically and for the labour market, which continue to echo to this day.
At that gathering Numsa also discussed setting up a “workers party” or a “united front” to take on the alliance electorally. It went on to do so, but the attempt fell flat in the 2019 election, with its Socialist Revolutionary Workers Party failing to win enough votes to secure a single seat in parliament.
SACP’s waning influence exposes internal fractures
At the time, the SACP was at the heart of Cosatu’s internal warfare. Numsa accused the party of driving a wedge between the unions in the federation, of abandoning its working class responsibilities and of being a mere “appendage” to the ANC.
This was a period when the SACP exerted considerable influence over the Zuma administration and made up a large portion of his executive. Its stance on the ANC shifted when only a handful of its leaders made it onto the party’s national executive committee in 2022 and it was crowded out of cabinet by the parties constituting the coalition government after the 2024 election.
Cosatu expelled Numsa in 2014 after a debilitating internal fight that culminated in the formation of the SA Federation of Trade Unions, led by axed Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi.
Economic reality bites: politics could be suicidal
Cosatu was severely weakened, and many of its affiliates bled members.
— Dividing workers politically at a time when unions are already under siege due to retrenchments and job losses would be suicidal for Cosatu.
Now the state of the economy is also weighing heavily on union membership, particularly industrial unions such as the National Union of Mineworkers. Dividing workers politically at a time when unions are already under siege due to retrenchments and job losses would be suicidal for Cosatu.
“To maintain our unity today we must continue to put workers first, above party loyalties … unity is not a slogan, it is a living practice,” Cosatu president Zingiswa Losi told the gathering.
“We love the ANC of Oliver Tambo and Nelson Mandela. We love the SACP of Joe Slovo and Chris Hani … we need both the ANC and the SACP to appreciate the unity of the federation,” she said.
It is clear that Cosatu is turning inward for now, focusing on its own unity and stability in the face of an economic onslaught rather than stepping into the ANC-SACP dogfight.
It will have an opportunity to revisit its stance at its national congress next year, a matter of months before the elections, but this won’t stop both parties from pushing and pulling in the hope that it will eventually pick a side.
• Marrian is Business Day editor at large.
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