President of WFTU
General Secretary
Our hosts from the VGCL
Delegates to this Presidential Council
Dear Comrades,
On behalf of Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) and the working class of South Africa, please receive revolutionary greetings. COSATU appreciates the opportunity to be part of this historic gathering of the militant, class-oriented and revolutionary trade union movement from all parts of the world.
This important gathering could not have taken place at an appropriate moment in history and this very beautiful country of the brave Vietnamese people. Our presence is not just for this gathering, but to express our full solidarity with the inspiration represented by this place of Hanoi and the heroic struggles that came to define the land of Ho Chi Minh.
We join the millions of working people all over the world to celebrate the legendary 80 years of WFTU existence and struggles. It was 80 years ago when the most advanced, militant and class-oriented trade unions of the world gathered in the city of London to give birth to this giant, which was to redefine 20th-century history in all continents of the world.
We wish to pay special tribute to the support WFTU gave to the working class of Africa and in our own country, South Africa against apartheid colonialism. WFTU was never on the fence when it came to the most decisive battles against imperialism, colonialism and apartheid. Today we stand proud to be counted amongst the torchbearers of advanced working-class traditions and struggles.
We wish to briefly reflect on our journey as COSATU and the whole working class of South Africa since the 1994 defeat of apartheid and the ongoing struggles against poverty, unemployment and inequalities. It is no accident that South Africa has the highest inequalities in the world, precisely because apartheid spatial planning designated most of the people, particularly the black working class as the outcasts of the economic and political system. The class, gender and racial inequalities have been systematically entrenched over years, and this is reproducing the current levels of poverty and exclusion of the working class and the poor.
The crisis of capitalism is making the world even more dangerous in its desperate search for profit, as wars of conquest, occupation and plunder are on the rise in all continents of the world. Imperialism is desperate for control of global energy sources, rare earth minerals, land and water resources, hence the heightened aggression of indigenous people all over the world.
In this regard, South Africa has come under the spotlight of the racist US Administration of Trump which is fighting against land redress and our efforts to correct the injustices of colonialism and apartheid.
The democratic government led by the ANC has promulgated a Land Expropriation Act which is about reversing apartheid land patterns in ownership, control and use of land. This Act puts land under the democratic control and ownership of the majority to ensure access to land for development, economic opportunities and livelihoods. But a minority of whites, largely Afrikaaners, are resistant and have now mobilised the US President to sanction and suffocate our country to bully us into submission. They are using the tactics used over the years against progressive and revolutionary governments and struggles all over the world. We can affirm that we shall fight with all energies at our disposal against bullying and apartheid economic exclusion of our people, workers in particular.
We call for more solidarity from the WFTU and all progressive forces to support our call for an end to apartheid land systems and racist concentration of wealth in the hands of a few to the exclusion of the majority. This is the case with many parts of our continent, Africa and the stranglehold of imperialism that keeps our people suffocating from underdevelopment, poverty and exclusion.
We wish to also affirm full solidarity with the people of Palestine against the Zionist war by the apartheid state of Israel. We also stand in full solidarity with the people of Cuba against the US embargo and for their sovereign right to their chosen path of development. We further call for unity against austerity, neoliberalism, hunger, unemployment and all forms of injustice.
Towards that end, we wish to call for a revitalisation of the global progressive movement and solidarity work. We are particularly calling for more focus on the following;
- Building a united front of the progressive working-class movement against austerity and economic subjugation through land dispossessions, monopoly control over natural resources, capitalist models of development and global inequalities and poverty
- Strengthening the BRICS Trade Union Forum and WFTU axis of cooperation to advance decent work, working-class internationalism and solidarity
- Dedicated Focus on Africa as the most underdeveloped continent in the world and carrying the heaviest chain of imperialist subjugation, particularly the call for the industrialisation of our continent to end hunger, poverty and unemployment