THE MISGUIDED MILITANCY OF SOUTH AFRICAN TRADE UNIONS

The South African labour field is currently facing a very serious challenge. There is a very worrying trend that is manifesting itself; a Lonmin mineworker was shot dead at a shebeen (tavern) and all of a sudden this "bar-brawl" is becoming a serious national and international issue, and the whole country is being made to suffer.

It transpires the person who was shot at a tavern was actually a high-ranking member of the new trade union AMCU; and AMCU has been quick to accuse the rival trade union NUM for this tavern killing. AMCU members immediately opted to shut down the mine; demanding that Lonmin management must close down the NUM offices, because the latter is no longer "the majority union" at Lonmin.

The AMCU members vowed that they will not allow anyone to work at the mine until their demands are met. Consequently, the share price of Lonmin has gone down by more than seven percent; and the South African currency, the Rand, depreciated to its four year lows at R10.27 per USA dollar.  

AMCU was the new trade union that flouted all the Labour Relations Act (LRA) provisions last year, 2012, when they instigated violent protests that culminated in the deaths of over 44 people in Marikana. Rather than learning from Marikana tragedy , AMCU is now using last year's deaths as its platform for more rhetoric to urge people to go out on wildcat strikes.

It has been quite clear that some political formations and political opportunists have seen the Marikana deaths as a God-sent gift they must fully exploit to score many cheap political points against the ANC ruling party. This can be supported by the fact that some political parties were invited to speak at the AMCU Workers Day rally where the ANC became the only target of criticism by the invited political speakers; and such speakers hardly said anything about the real labour challenges of South Africa.

AMCU is now the majority trade union at Lonmin mines; and the workers there are excited about it because it makes many promises that it cannot deliver on. For example, last year AMCU said "R12 500.00 or nothing" for all its workers, promising that they (AMCU) would be able to move workers' wages from a monthly average of R5000.00 to more than R12 500.00 a month, which meant wage increases of more than 100 percent.

AMCU did not deliver on this wage increase, but the workers have joined it because of this militant rhetoric; and thousands of mineworkers' jobs have been lost in the process, and foreign investors' confidence in South African has consequently been negatively affected.

It is very unfortunate that the much more experienced National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has now fallen into the same trap as its populist AMCU; the NUM has now also decided to follow the AMCU brinksmanship by itself now demanding wage increases of sixty percent (60%) in order to reclaim its lost membership from AMCU.  This is disappointing as NUM should have known better that two wrongs don't make right. 

It was, however, not my intention to concentrate on the mining sector. This article analyses this misguided trade union militancy throughout the South African landscape.

One Chinese proverb says "when planning for a year, plant corn. When planning for a decade, plant trees. When planning for life, educate people." Under normal circumstances, most of us would believe that all of our educators value education and that they would pride themselves in producing the best students; unfortunately, South Africa is not necessarily a normal country when it comes to labour matters.

It is clear to most political observers and education observers that the major dispute between the education trade unions ant the National Minister of Basic Education had very little to do with the advancement of education; and everything to do with politics. It is clear that many trade union office- bearers currently want to be seen as the most radical and the most militant so that they may PESONALLY have their names making it on the political party nomination lists for the next year's national general elections.

It is unfortunate that the State President's 2013 State of the Nation address categorised education as an "essential service". It is understandable why many people and some politicians may like to have education formally classified as an "essential service" in order to prevent educators from going on their regular strikes. Unfortunately, any discussions of "essential services" as a proposed solution to our education challenges can only act as an unnecessary distraction to our problems.

Section 213 of the Labour Relations Act defines essential service as "a service the interruption of which endangers the life, personal safety

or health of the whole or any part of the population". It is clear from this definition that any effort by the government to classify education as an essential service would be constitutionally invalid and hence legislatively inappropriate.

It is therefore important that the community must act collectively to put pressure on the politicians and education office bearers to make the full use of the appropriate provisions of the Education Labour Relations Act (ELRA) to hold educators accountable for the education of our children. This is where things go wrong; politicians have no political will to act firmly on education problems, because the education trade unions are the major campaigners when it comes to political elections, and many politicians are themselves beneficiaries of such destructive politicization of education.

It is unfortunate that the secretary-general of NUMSA trade union has decided to use the National Development Plan as a convenient target for setting some political scores. The chain reaction to this has been alarming; many COSATU activists are gradually joining this NDP bashing brigade; and the South African Communist Party is now the latest member of this NDP bashing brigade.

The consequence of this opportunist political posturing is that the masses who may still believe in the political clap-trap of such stakeholders is that they may start doubting the necessity of having pragmatic objectives solutions to our economic and political challenges.

Is this not the time most South Africans of reason stand up and be counted in resisting having this country dragged down to ruins by opportunists who abuse the platforms created by our good labour laws in order to advance their own political ambitions at the expense of the greater population?

Professor Bonke Dumisa UKZN School of Management IT and Governance. He is also an Advocate of the High Courts of South Africa and Lesotho.

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