The Congress of South African Trade Unions calls on all workers to rally around the upcoming banking sectors strike against retrenchments that is organised by Sasbo and led by the Federation COSATU. This is a Section 77 national strike that forms part of a build-up to a National COSATU Strike on the 07th of October 2019, the International Day of Decent Work Day
The Federation is pushing back against the attempts by the Business Unity South Africa (BUSA) to interdict the Friday National Strike. We encourage all workers to attend the court hearing on this matter this coming Wednesday, 25 September 2019 at the Gauteng High Court, where we will legally oppose the interdict application by BUSA.
The business lobby group should know that by trying to sabotage the coming strike it is only delaying the pain because workers will not be cowed and intimidated by its legal challenges.
COSATU has resolved to do more to hold the private sector accountable. We are no longer prepared to just rely on using the state to discipline capital. The banking sector has been one of the most profitable sectors in the last two decades and they do not have a crisis of profits.
They are abusing mechanisation and digitisation by retrenching workers without developing a jobs-plan that will ensure a just transition to new technologies. The money that the banks have been using to make these colossal profits and pay exorbitant bonuses belongs to the workers.
More than half of the South African population live in poverty, in fact, the number of people living in extreme poverty has increased significantly over the last couple of years when the banks were making massive profits and paying exorbitant bonuses. Even the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) that primarily works for the bank admitted that ‘in per capita terms South Africans are poorer than they were in 2014’.
The bank colludes on their charges and in their lending practices they have recklessly made more than 11 million people highly indebted and are not bothered by broader economic development imperatives in their decisions.
The attempts by the business lobby group BUSA to use the courts of law to undermine Nedlac and coerce workers into submission will fail. All COSATU affiliated unions will mobilise to ensure that this Sasbo organised banking sector strike on the 27th of September is successful and also that a National Strike on the 07th of October 2019.
Issued by COSATU
Sizwe Pamla (Cosatu National Spokesperson)
Tel: 011 339 4911
Fax: 011 339 5080
Cell: 060 975 6794