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13 March, 2012On 23 February NUMSA held its first ever Political Commission attended by President Jacob Zuma, COSATU General Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi and SACP CC Member Charles Setsebi. Whilst President Zuma was received with a rousing welcome, with song and dance in a beautiful marquee draped in red and yellow at the NUMSA building in Johannesburg's Bree Street, this was a very serious affair.
The commission was organised as part of the NUMSA NEC so that union leaders could take time to review the triple crisis of unemployment, poverty and inequality and consider what needs to be done to ensure that working class interests are served by state policies and actions. Once it got started, there was no holding back and a great deal came under scrutiny, from self reflection on the state of political consciousness within the unions to party leadership, political divisions and the formation of camps ahead of the ANC congress in December this year.
President Zuma spoke of himself as a worker and said he owed everything that he had become to the unions. "No matter what you do with me, I remain a worker... Until the end of time at the centre of me will be working class feelings". He talked of the relationship between workers and the ANC and paid tribute to the role that workers had played throughout the party's history. He spoke of the political consciousness of workers being a driving force in the ANC.
President Zuma told delegates that union leaders need to get more involved in the ANC. He claimed that the movement's "biggest shortcoming" was that the leaders of the bigger unions are not on the ANC's national executive committee saying, "How can you not be at the centre of things, where national decisions are made?" In 2007, COSATU General Secretary Zwelinzima Vavi turned down his nomination for a position on the NEC and it can be argued that by doing so, he has retained political strength, enabling the labour leader to remain critical of national decisions and party progress.
Comrade Vavi spoke openly at the meeting about the challenges negotiating the political environment within the Alliance ahead of the numerous congresses at union, federation and party level this year, which will elect leadership. "It's difficult to have an open and honest discussion, any statement is interpreted in line with the prevailing political environment... there's an intolerance of different views... comrades are even carrying knives against one another", said Comrade Vavi. He painted a picture of an intimidating environment, "There's a big drive to keep everyone quiet. You are either with us or against us... if you're against us we're smashing you".
Unionists were critical of the poor performance of the ANC on important issues such as labour brokering.Comments about the current ANC NEC made by Karl Cloete, Deputy General Secretary of NUMSA, ruffled feathers and the media has had a good time sensationalising this.
But for NUMSA the crux of the issue is the need for greater worker participation in the ANC. The union wants workers to work within the structures of the ANC to ensure that those elected to lead the party will serve the interests of the working class. NUMSA also called on workers to swell the ranks of the SACP, saying this is an important political insurance of working class emancipation and believes that the SACP must be at the centre of leading popular struggles of the working class for working class power.
The Political Commission was about much more than party politics. The forum was put in place to debate reforms needed for transforming the economy and society to benefit the majority of South Africans. NUMSA believes that "the wealth of the country must be transferred into the hands of the people as a whole, as a precondition for the attainment of genuine democracy and durable peace in our country," said Irvin Jim, General Secretary of NUMSA. "To this end, we still believe that there is no alternative to a popular, not elite, nationalisation, for socialisation of the strategic economic sectors. As we move in that direction, we also affirm that South Africa requires a truly new and revolutionary, redistributive, job-led growth path."
NUMSA criticised the State of the Nation Address and the Budget Speech as, "rather disappointing insofar as major changes in the economy are required: we note in so many ways that our government appears to be amplifying all the most destructive tendencies of our apartheid capitalist economy and society," said Comrade Jim. "We see very little in the infrastructure-centric growth strategy to give us confidence, because the spending anticipated is pro-corporate, too capital-intensive, too import-reliant, too extractive-oriented, too vulnerable to volatile world markets, and too ecologically damaging."
Comrade Jim referred to the Freedom Charter several times, calling for a return to the Charter to find the way forward on many pressing issues that the country faces.
Despite all the speculation on why NUMSA held the Political Commission, what it represented in the overall political arena of the Alliance, why political leadership participated, what was said, what was meant by what was said and so on, this unique event reclaimed political space for the working class and took a step towards rebuilding political consciousness amongst unionists.