The National Education, Health & Allied Workers Union (Nehawu) is in upheaval in parliament. Disciplinary proceedings and the precautionary suspension of the union’s branch secretary on union work-related charges — trumped up after unsuccessfully contesting for provincial office, according to supporters — has triggered a wave of resignations.
This rare show of dissatisfaction with union management is aimed at getting the national Nehawu leadership involved after a recently elected branch task team was thwarted. According to the union constitution, resignees remain in good standing for another three months.
Unhappiness with the branch leadership has simmered for many months. Questions have been raised over the still outstanding “equal work for equal pay” in the protection service, and the consolidated lowest salary band. Insiders have also questioned employment terms and conditions, appropriateness of appointments, a lack of staff and equipment, and more.
In to-and-fro communications by both sides the current Nehawu branch leaders seem unmoved over what the others call “a constitutional act of protest”. Instead, the incumbent executive insists the next branch leadership elections will be in 2027 as scheduled and only they are the representatives in the legislative sector bargaining chamber.
Though Nehawu has lost union subs, it remains the majority union. From October 1 under the labour legislation’s agency shop agreement anyone who is not part of the majority union will have an agency fee deducted from their salary.
It’s a story of power plays, factionalism and shoddy service, with a dash of whispering campaigns, after Nehawu’s parliamentary branch came to the fore a decade ago. In 2015 Nehawu went head-to-head with the parliamentary administration over performance bonuses, salary, and insourcing of catering and cleaning staff. “ePalamente sifuna imali. Asonwabanga!” (Parliament, we want money. We are not happy) resounded across the parliamentary precinct, where in November 2015 police fired stun and smoke grenades at Nehawu strikers.
While workers returned to work from December that year, labour tensions remained. The breach of trust between the administration and Nehawu seemed to play a role in disciplinary proceedings against the then secretary to parliament, who in October 2019 was dismissed by unanimous agreement in both houses of parliament. The motion on the order papers is part of the public record.
Perhaps by then Nehawu seemed to believe itself to be kingmaker. In early 2024 the union’s parliamentary branch publicly backed the current secretary to parliament for the top post amid the controversy over the salary, which was advertised at about half the then still SA Local Government Association (Salga) CEO’s package. All of this is public record.
But against this backdrop the swathe of Nehawu union resignations earlier in September tells a broader tale of SA’s politics — interwoven threads of power plays, factionalism, grievance and hanging on to power at all cost.
Nehawu is the largest Cosatu union and organises across the state. What happens in Nehawu has impact. That impact is amplified as campaigning for the next municipal elections has effectively begun, though a polling date is still some 11 to 14 months off.
These long-run campaigns are testing. Criticism, even when generally accepted as justified, becomes weaponised — just ask President Cyril Ramaphosa. The backlash over his comments that ANC municipalities could learn from their DA counterparts is not about facts but an internal echo chamber. The telling of tales of — distant — success and status is used to smooth political egos. All with a hint of the emperor’s new clothes dynamic.
Nehawu’s national office-bearers seem reluctant to get involved, despite its parliamentary branch members’ call for action. Perhaps the focus is still on finalising the union’s municipal electoral preferences, but this wait and see serves no-one — not the union and certainly not SA.
• Merten is a veteran political journalist specialising in parliament and governance.
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