COSATU has avoided commenting on the election campaigns of opposition political parties during the elections, many of them do not warrant the attention of the biggest federation in this continent. However, one party, the DA, has chosen to unashamedly market itself as the nemesis of workers and has promised its funders that it will stop at nothing to destroy workers’ hard-won rights.
- The DA manifesto seeks to collapse the NMW by allowing workers to “agree” to waive it when a boss offers them a job.
- The DA proposes that the NMW be reduced to the level of a social grant.
- These include laws that protect workers from being unfairly dismissed or victimised, that guarantee minimum decent conditions of work e.g. not being forced to work excessive hours, ensure workers can work in a safe environment etc.
- Their response to the looting of SOEs is to punish workers and increase the already ballooning unemployment rate.
- Yet the DA has been pontificating to all and sundry that they are no longer a majority white party, are the most non-racial etc. This represents, in fact, a disservice to the national project of building a non-racial society.
Issued by COSATU
Sizwe Pamla (Cosatu National Spokesperson)
Tel: 011 339 4911
Fax: 011 339 5080
Cell: 060 975 6794