COSATU message to Marikana memorial services, 23 August 2012

On behalf of the 2.2 million members of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, we bring our heartfelt condolences to the families and fellow workers of those who perished in the tragic events in Marikana.

We join all South Africans, and many millions more across the globe, in mourning this tragic loss of 44 lives and we also send our best wishes to the 78 people who were injured and hope that they recover as quickly and fully as possible.

We share the pain, grief and despair that the families of the bereaved must be feeling. You have lost your loved ones, your husbands, sons and brothers, and in most cases have also lost the only breadwinner.

We know that most employed workers support as many as 12 family members from their meagre wages. The biggest source of income for the unemployed - 70% - is in the form of remittances from employed family members.

The families affected by this tragedy come from all over South Africa, not just around the mines, but in the ‘sending areas', the former ‘homelands' established by the apartheid regime to facilitate the supply of cheap labour in the mines.

COSATU will be holding a media conference tomorrow, Friday 24 August 2012 at 10h00, about the Marikana events, and on Tuesday, 28 August 2012 we shall issue a detailed report on the background to the workers' dispute with Lonmin and other related developments in the platinum mines and the trade union movement.

Now is not the time to go into this detailed assessment, nor to play the blame-game. We must await the findings of the Commission of Enquiry, which we hope will establish exactly what happened on that tragic day.

We must however appreciate the massive significance of this tragedy. After 18 years of democracy we have witnessed scenes which we had hoped were now only part of our history. For 34 workers to be killed within three minutes is a colossal disaster. It has understandably made headlines and provoked protests throughout the world.

We must reject any idea that this is just a normal feature of South African life and become immune to such unnecessary loss of life. Never again must we see such scenes on our TV screens!

One question which we have to confront immediately however, is what COSATU has raised for many years now the brutality and ‘skiet en donner' attitude on the part of the commanders of the police. While the Commission of Enquiry must determine precisely what happened - and we cannot attach blame until we have the full picture - there can be no doubt that the police response was excessive.

We have countless occasions protested against the immediate resort to firing live ammunition which reveals a serious lack of training and planning on crowd control tactics. Police must be trained to negotiate before opening fire with automatic rifles and live ammunition. We want to see riot shields, water-cannons and tear-gas not R5 automatic rifles to control crowds.

At the same time we must ensure that members of society do not carry dangerous weapons and our demonstrations must be peaceful and free from intimidation of those who choose not participate in our strikes or protest actions.

COSATU has consistently condemned the use of live ammunition in protest actions by workers and in communities, and will continue to argue for a better trained, better equipped and socially responsible police service.

We must also equally condemn the carrying and use of arms by demonstrators and strikers. Workers have every right to be militant and angry, but must also be peaceful, lawful and orderly, as COSATU has always insisted.

The underlying problems which give rise to incidents like those at Marikana are the stark levels of inequality in South Africa and the super-exploitation of workers by ruthless and rapacious employers. Since they discovered diamonds, gold and platinum these greedy companies forced people from all over Europe and Sub-Saharan Africa to go down every day deep in the bowels of the earth and dig out precious stones.

They work in most dangerous conditions in high temperatures, in damp and poorly ventilated areas where rocks fall daily, killing many and condemning others to a life in a wheelchair and the loss of limbs. Some families have never even had the chance to bury their breadwinners, whose bones remain buried underground.

The rock-drill operatives at the centre of the dispute perform a more dangerous, unhealthy and difficult job than anyone else. They face death every time they go down the shafts. Yet their monthly earnings are just R5 600!

Compare that to their bosses. The earnings of Lonmin's Financial officer, Alan Ferguson, are R10 254 972 a year, R854 581 a month, 152 times higher than a rock-drill operative! 

We urge the National Union of Mineworkers to take up their claim, with comparable demands for other workers in the industry, whose wages are equally pathetic, and whose living conditions are also still squalid and lacking in basic services.

The NUM has a proud 30-year history of fighting to improve the lives of this most exploited section of the working class. It has always been a fortress of the mine workers' struggle, championing their demands for better wages and working conditions. It has earned its stripes as a true representative of workers and lifted the bar for all the workers they represent.

As COSATU's biggest affiliate, with over 300 000 members, it will continue to defend and improve the lives of mineworkers and play a leading role in the federation for years to come.

But now the NUM, and the whole trade union movement, is facing a huge threat to workers' unity. The report to be issued on Tuesday will reveal what we have identified as a as a co-ordinated political strategy to use intimidation and violence, manipulated by disgruntled former union leaders, in a drive to create breakaway ‘unions' and divide and weaken the trade union movement.

In less than a month, the ‘workers' parliament', COSATU's National Congress, will be convening. While we shall be celebrating yet another record level of membership, we will also have to discuss how we can defeat this attempt to divide and weaken the workers, how we can give even better service to our members, and cut the ground from under the feet of these bogus breakaway ‘unions' and their political and financial backers.

We must do everything possible to prevent splits and preserve and strengthen our unity. The old slogan: "United we stand - Divided we Fall" is not empty rhetoric. It is the key to our success in transforming workers' lives, building prosperous and peaceful world and preventing any more Marikanas.

Statement issued by Patrick Craven, COSATU national spokesperson, August 23 2012

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