COSATU rejects BUSA's anti-democratic blackmail proposals

The Congress of South African Trade Unions condemns the surreptitious and sinister attempt by Business Unity South Africa (Busa) to pressurise government into undemocratically adopting pro-business and anti-worker economic policies, which it fears may be rejected by delegates at the ANC Conference in Mangaung in December.

BUSA CEO, Nomaxabiso Majokweni, told Business Day that the government "had to prove that perceptions in sections of the private sector that economic decisions could be affected by the ANC's conference were misplaced" (see here).

In other worlds government should not listen to the 4000 democratically elected delegates of its own party, representing the poor majority of South Africans, but to a small bunch of unelected, rich investors and their "rating agencies", whose confidence needs to be restored.

Majokweni argued that the promises made last month by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan to tighten fiscal discipline were "a good attempt" to revive stalling economic growth but required more action and less talk.

While all South Africans would agree on the need for "more action and less talk", the poor majority and the working class will not support the kind of "action" that BUSA is proposing, such as arresting the rising public sector wage bill.

In particular COSATU is totally opposed to a BUSA proposal for a "total review" of the industrial relations system, including laws and the functioning of institutions such as Nedlac. They want this to be carried out by "a presidential panel of experts" who would report to the president on what should be changed. BUSA further proposes a "code on strikes and picketing".

There can be little doubt, given its past record, that BUSA will not be looking for changes to improve workers' wages and working conditions and better protect their rights and, but measures to weaken the labour laws, further limit the right to strike, make it even easier to hire and fire workers, cut the cost of doing business, and intensify the super-exploitation of their employees.

Changes to the labour laws that they want to review are the very issues which Nedlac has been thoroughly debating over the past months, but BUSA is clearly not happy with the proposed changes to the labour laws which are now before Parliament. So they want to sneak behind the backs of both the Nedlac representatives and the Members of Parliament, and take their proposals straight to the President, no doubt with warnings of the dire consequences to "investor confidence" if he does not agree with them.

There is a consistent anti-democratic thread running through these proposals. BUSA wants government to be guided not by the elected ANC conference delegates or the representatives of business, labour and community in Nedlac but to a few "experts", who will report directly to the Union Buildings. They want to by-pass established democratic structures and procedures in favour of lobbying government behind the scenes.

COSATU urges the President to reject these moves with the contempt that they deserve.

Statement issued by Patrick Craven, COSATU national spokesperson, November 5 2012

Click here to sign up to receive our free daily headline email newsletter