Numsa's Response to the New Age Headline Story of 24th June 2013 titled "Party plan in overdrive",

Numsa notes, with shock and disgust, the contents of The New Age newspaper front page headline story of the 24th June 2013 titled "Party plan in overdrive".

Barely a week goes by without a newspaper publishing absolute lies hiding behind "sources" to mask its dishonesty. True to form, The New Age story does the same.

The story is simply absurd. One of the people it alleges was in Limpopo at the meeting is actually in China and he says he has not been in Limpopo for the past seven months. The General Secretary of Numsa was not present in such a meeting if there ever such a meeting. In fact the General Secretary was in Johannesburg doing Numsa work over the alleged period.

Although disgusted, we are not at all surprised by these allegations but we view them as an attempt by enemies of Numsa to discredit our leadership. Just a few weeks ago, there was a Newspaper story suggesting that our GS has joined WASP. Now there is another one which suggests that he is joining EFF. How can one join two political parties in a space of two weeks?

This story is part of an attempt by some within and outside our movement to discredit any critical voice. If we are not linked to joining liberal organizations such as Agang we are alleged to be joining organizations such as WASP and EFF. They throw any mud hoping that it will stick. We view this as part of an offensive against the unity of the working class within and outside of the movement, in this phase of the capitalist crisis.

The New Age is a mischievous newspaper. Despite the General Secretary of Numsa denying this suggestion to the journalists of the New Age (who called Irvin Jim over the weekend), The New Age nevertheless went ahead and published the story.

If The New Age wanted to tell its readers that it has difficulty with the formation of EFF, it should have been honest to say so. It should not write a story whose title is "Party plan in overdrive" when the actual story is full of people denying associating with the party, or denying intending to join the party. This is exactly what The New Age wanted to achieve.

We expect that after this statement The New Age will write another nonsensical headline titled: "Numsa dumps Malema" as if there was any link between Numsa and Malema's party. We at Numsa wish to record our utmost disgust and horror at this dangerous, unprincipled, abuse of journalistic licence employed by The New Age.

If The New Age wanted to know what NUMSA's attitude to the New Party, they should have been honest to ask that question and we would have answered them rather than think they can solicit our response by way of allegation.

Neither Numsa nor the General Secretary of Numsa will be bullied by any media, let alone the extremely immature, unprofessional The New Age newspaper, into acting, doing or saying anything. Our positions as a union are clearly spelt out in our Congress resolutions.

Numsa will, with the resolve of steel, defend its right to meet with, consult, talk to, and work with, any citizen or citizens of South Africa and the world working class in the defence of workers' rights and to advance the national democratic revolution as the direct route to socialism and nowhere else, in our country. 

Further, Numsa will defend, with our blood if need be, the right of the working class to peacefully meet, consult, talk to, indeed act, with any person or organisation in the best interest of the working class in particular. 

In fact, what we need now is for as broad as possible a front of left forces, to unite under the banner of Socialism, to take war to capital in the face of the on-going economic crisis, and in the face of the persistent catastrophic legacy of Colonialism of a Special Type.

We wish to warn South Africans to the dangers of succumbing to the dirty tricks such as are being employed by The New Age in this story. These tricks are an attack on our hard won democratic freedoms to associate, assemble and freely express ourselves, with anyone. These rights are underwritten in blood. Indeed, NUMSA is keen to meet anyone who agrees with the vision outlined in the Freedom Charter as a direct route to socialism.

We have not met Malema and his grouping. The fact that we deny that we met Malema must never be misread to mean that we are renouncing our right to meet him, if we so desire. Should, and if and when Numsa formally resolves to meet with Malema and his grouping, there will be no need for us to keep this a secret from anyone.

We have a duty, underwritten in blood, to defend this inalienable right. To forcefully and unethically elicit from Irvin Jim, or anyone for that matter, a response designed to further or thwart the political objectives of this or that political grouping by any newspapers is to violate the rights to associate and freedom of expression. This is the cheapest form of media bullying and blackmail.  We hate it. We will defeat it. It must be defeated.

Our General Secretary has the full confidence of the entire 311 000 plus Numsa family to carry out his day to day duties, which include assessing, every minute, the political climate in the country. He thus has the confidence of Numsa, should he so judge, according to our Numsa Constitution and Congress Mandates, to meet with anyone, to advance our perspectives. This is one of the key responsibilities he was elected to discharge, for the union. Thus far, he has carried this responsibility with distinction. In carrying out this important work, he is answerable only to the members of Numsa and its constitutional structures, not to The New Age newspaper or anyone else.

Numsa will explore all its available options - including political (boycott of the newspaper) and legal action and approaching the relevant self-regulatory media structures - to respond to this dangerous emerging media practice of attempting to bully, nay, to blackmail us, into false anti-working class positions in order to satisfy other interests other than our members and the broader working class.

Apart from delegitimizing and silencing us, in case The New Age thinks we do not know the potential danger of their kind of story, we need only to remind them that people were wrongly necklaced, in the townships, and killed, in the 80s, simply because some idiot started rumours that they were spies.

We also know that during the reign of Stalin in the Soviet Union, and in Hitler's German, thousands of people were slaughtered because of the tricks and kind of story telling the print media in general in this country, and The New Age is using in its story on Malema's planned party.    

Again, we regard the headline story of The New Age of the 24th of June 2013 as a dangerous precedent in the media capable of diluting our hard-won freedoms. And we will respond accordingly at all times.

Statement issued by Castro Ngobese, Numsa Spokesperson, June 26 2013

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