01 - 03 March 2010 COSATU CEC press statement

The Central Executive Committee of the Congress of South African Trade Unions, comprising national office bearers and representatives of all 21 affiliated unions and provincial structures, held a scheduled meeting from 01-03 March 2010.

2010 will be a historic year for South Africa, when we host the FIFA Soccer World Cup, the biggest soccer spectacle in the world. We acknowledge the role played by the workers who built the stadiums and call upon the Local Organising Committee to honour its promise of free tickets.

It is also a year in which we face massive political and socio-economic challenges.

The economic crisis

The financial crisis that developed into a full-blown economic recession continues to ravage our country and the world, and the workers, as always, are the biggest victims.

In the last nine months we lost 959 000 jobs, a new record, and workers lost a staggering R17 billion, further worsening the inequalities in our country.

Unemployment rose from 23.6% to 24.5% when only counting workers who are actively searching for work. By the expanded definition that counts workers who have given up looking for work, unemployment rose from 32.5 to 34.4%.

Figures for the last quarter of 2009 indicate that the situation improved slightly, with 89 000 new jobs being created, but mainly in the informal sector, where millions are involved in survivalist activities.

In the past 16 years, under the leadership of the ANC, we have made tremendous progress in achieving the goals of the national democratic revolution. But as we have said over and over again, in economic terms the main benefits of economic transformation accrued more to white monopoly capital than it did to workers.

The apartheid political economy fault lines remain largely in place

Structural unemployment remains intact despite modest progress.

The apartheid economy deliberately created cheap labour reserves through the hated system of Bantustans, pass laws and other influx controls measures. Till today this has meant that unemployment and poverty remain extremely high in the former ‘homelands areas'. The apartheid growth path relied heavily on mineral resources, that were largely exported unprocessed, to hasten industrialisation in the colonising countries. It relied on capital intensive sectors of the economy which marginalised and excluded the majority. Regrettably this apartheid growth path remains in place 16 years after the democratic breakthrough.

Poverty continues to afflict millions despite progress registered. Thanks to government social wage policies, poverty has declined since 1994. Over 12 million people, mostly children and women, benefit from the social grants which government has extended and equalised. Recently government announced that 2 million more children will qualify for social grants. Over 15 million people now have shelter thanks to the construction of over 2.7 million houses. Health care has been more accessible. More children are at school now than any other time.

Despite this progress, however, millions of our people remain trapped in degrading and dehumanising poverty across the country. Poverty, like unemployment continues to have racial, gender and age dimensions.

Inequalities are now deeper than before.

Recent studies indicate that South Africa has now surpassed Brazil in terms of inequalities. Inequalities remain characterized by the apartheid social ordering. Whites remain better off than Indians, Indians remain better off than Coloureds and Coloureds remain better off than Africans. To add salt to the injury inequalities are now growing within every racial group.

Oppression and super exploitation of workers continues, despite government and union efforts.

The super exploitation and oppression of workers remain widespread across the length and breadth of our country.

Capital has succeeded in restructuring the working class. We have a two-tier labour market system already in the country. Broadly the workers who are covered by the collective bargaining system through workplace, sectoral and industry wide bargaining councils are relatively better off. They enjoy better job security, better pay with improved working conditions and are generally protected by the labour laws.

But there is a second layer of workers who are not unionised, who are not covered by the increasingly unrepresentative bargaining councils, who are not protected by the labour laws and who are facing the brutality of labour brokers, merchandisers, farm and domestic employers, etc, etc. This includes all those who are in the informal sector or employed in small operations. All of these are victims of outsourcing, subcontracting and mechanisation of work. 

These workers earn much less and have poor working conditions and no job security. Unions and government have largely failed to protect this category of workers. Despite fine resolutions to organise them they remain outside the unions and government has not developed the capacity to protect these workers.

Government's threat to introduce a wage subsidy to encourage employers to employ young people will mean creation of a third category of the super-super exploited workers.

It is in this context we warmly welcome the Industrial Policy Action Plan 2 (IPAP2) released by the government's economic cluster. This will go a long way to address the apartheid political economy fault lines and hopefully break the backbone of unemployment, poverty and inequality.

We however warn that for industrial policies to succeed they must be supported by appropriate macroeconomic policies. The current macroeconomic stance will make even the good initiatives such as industrial policy or new growth path still-born.

The CEC expressed concern that the government's macroeconomic policies remain an area of heavy contestation. In the past all Alliance difficulties and divisions emanated from disagreements on this front. In the recent past and certainly post the Polokwane 52nd ANC National Conference, we argued that the policy gaps including in this area of the macroeconomy has been narrowed significantly. We were correct! The series of Alliance Summits including the Alliance Economic Summit's resolutions have gone a long way to close the policy gaps.

Regrettably, to our frustration and anger, the government continues with the tendency inherited from the previous administration to ignore policy directives it does not like and only implement those areas that the markets/capital are happy with. In this regard we are angry that the Treasury remain infected by the highly organised but conservative bureaucrats who have been driving neo liberal and conservative policies for the past 16 years.

The Federation will continue to insist that the Alliance Summit resolutions must form the basis of government policy. For example, the November 2009 Summit's commission on socio-economic policy agreed that we are in a serious crisis and, as such, we need to act with appropriate urgency and decisiveness in implementing the response and restructuring the economy. The commission was unanimous in raising concerns about the overvaluing of the currency and resolved, among others, that:

• There is a need to link our short-term cyclical response with our long term objectives of transforming the structure of the economy and moving to a different growth path.
• We must ensure greater coordination between macro and micro economic policy to ensure that they help the developmental state agenda of building the economy and create decent jobs.
• The Alliance Task Team on macro-economic policy must remain seized with the issue of broadening the mandate of the Reserve Bank and promoting a more competitive exchange rate and to report to Alliance structures by April 2010.
• Inflation targeting be scrapped as it is an inappropriate policy instrument.
• We must use the crisis to transform the economy and change patterns of ownership in the economy, consider measures to restore wealth to the majority of the people through the use of nationalization as articulated in the historic and policy perspectives of the movement.
• The commission called for the strengthening of capital exchange controls and to ensure that capital is not allowed to take money out of the country to invest in financial speculation but redirected to invest in the productive sectors of the economy.  

Important elements of this broad agreement have not being taken forward by the government. We cannot continue going to meetings, argue our case and win the day by convincing the majority in the meeting only for those decisions to be undermined and sidestepped by bureaucrats in the Treasury and by government leaders.

We have decided to revive the COSATU campaign against unemployment and poverty we launched in 1999. We will embark on the following steps immediately:

1. We will convene a meeting of the three federations (COSATU, FEDUSA and NACTU) to discuss this state of affairs in line with the resolutions of the recent Nedlac labour conference. In this meeting we will discuss and resolve whatever outstanding disagreements that may still exist on labour brokering. Further to this we will decide how we can work together more systematically to unite all workers' organisations through a more systematic campaign to challenge and change the apartheid political economy fault lines. We hope we will convene a broad workers' summit during 2010.

2. We will convene meetings with civil society formations across all provinces to discuss with them how we can coordinate our efforts to continue our common campaigns against the apartheid political economy fault lines.

3. We will call for a meeting with the leadership of the ANC to discuss in particular our rejection of the wage subsidy policy for youth employment. In this meeting we will take the opportunity to explain why we reacted angrily to the budget speech policy framework, which undermined the spirit of the Alliance Summits.

4. During the month of March and April we will convene COSATU Provincial Shop Steward Councils as well as workplace meetings to canvas support for rolling mass action against apartheid economy fault lines. The CEC have instructed the COSATU National Office Bearers to instruct our lawyers to submit a Section 77 notice tailored to cover our demands on the following:

a) Demand for a total ban of the labour brokering system as well as implementation of other measures to protect vulnerable workers such as farm workers and workers employed in small/medium enterprises who are facing the brunt of super-super exploitation

b) Withdrawal of the wage subsidy policy contained in the speech of the Finance Minister that will further restructure working class and open young people to super exploitation

c) Macroeconomic policy that supports and not undermines a new growth path and industrial policy.  

5. To support the IPAP2 and to seek to ensure that it comprehensively addresses the apartheid political economy structural fault lines in the economy and put our economy in the mass job creation path.

6. The CEC discussed the COSATU draft growth path developed by the COSATU Policy Unit and decided to convene a meeting with the COSATU economic advisors in the Walking Through the Open Doors Project to take further comments before releasing the proposals at the end of the month. Once again COSATU is proving that it is not just being critical but offering no alternative policy. We were the first institution to table industrial policy document whose many elements have now been taken forward by the IPAP2. We will be the first institution to release proposals for a new growth path.

7. We have instructed our provincial structures to ensure that the programme adopted by the November 2009 COSATU CEC to interact more systematically with communities campaigning against poor or lack of service delivery is taken to new heights. In this regard the COSATU locals throughout the length and breadth of country will convene community based meetings to listen to the grievances on the working class communities and to take up issues communities raises with relevant authorities. From now onwards COSATU will form part of all community campaigns as we did throughout our history. But we will ensure that genuine protests are not hijacked by the criminal elements that are involved in the wanton destruction of property and other acts of criminality. These violent protest actions just like any violent strikes only take away attention from the genuine grievances.

8. We will continue with the constructive engagement with the 16 government departments we have identified in order to develop common campaigns to address the apartheid political economy fault lines as well as to deepen transformation of our society.  At the CEC we had an honour to be addressed by the Minister for Cooperative Government, comrade Sicelo Shiceka. We will continue to work with him to address the many challenges faced by local governments and our communities.

9. We will approach the government so that structures are put in place to facilitate participation of labour in the decision-making processes on how the R846 billion allocated on infrastructure will be spent. We demand that government uses the same aggression and efficiency it used to build stadiums and other infrastructure for the FIFA 2010 World Cup to roll out infrastructure in the working class communities in order to address the apartheid spatial development patterns, build transport and road infrastructure and other amenities.

NERSA decision and Eskom

The CEC endorsed the total rejection of Eskom's 25% a year tariff increases and raised questions as to the role of NERSA, which has blatantly ignored the overwhelming opposition to the increases expressed by the public at their hearings.

We remain opposed to privatisation of power generating capacity and provision of electricity. Accordingly we completely reject the introduction of IPPs into the sector. Privatisation is not an answer or panacea to societal problems. It will increase and not decrease the prices, it will sideline those who want access to electricity and will make the current prices increases look like a Sunday school picnic.

We will engage with the ANC on two areas:

1. We are concerned about the reports that the ANC investment arm has invested in Eskom, raising serious questions of and inherent conflict of interest. The problem with this is that the ANC will not be able to ward off genuine concerns that it may have decided to accept the extraordinarily high tariffs imposed on the poor and industry irrespective of consequences because it stands to benefit. If this is true that the ANC Company has invested in Eskom then God help us all.

2. To the best of our recollection there is no ANC policy calling for the introduction of private investors in power generation. Where and when was this decision taken? To us this, together with the policy on wages subsidies for the youth, is an example of how conservative and pro-business bureaucrats manipulate and sidestep democratic processes.

We shall immediately submit a new Section 77 Notice, or possibly use the existing and previously submitted one which was never resolved, and if the tariff policy is not changed, to embark on strike action and street protests against increases which will devastate poor consumers, push up inflation and lead, according to the estimate of the SA Chamber of Commerce and Industry to 250 000 more jobs being lost. We are happy that this is a resolution arrived at the recent labour conference and therefore the decision to submit a Section 77 notice has a full support of both FEDUSA and NACTU.  

Campaigns to make our country and democracy work for the majority

The 2009 ANC election manifesto identified the key challenges and priorities we face - jobs, education, health, rural development/food security/agrarian reforms and crime and corruption.

The government has made a good start on tackling these challenges, and has been much more open is debating policy options. Contrary to media reports, COSATU's responses to both the State of the Nation and Budget speeches were well balanced. They warmly welcomed the many positive aspects of both.

We particularly welcomed the Finance Minister's frank assessment of the extent of the crisis of unemployment, poverty and inequality and his agreement to COSATU's call for a new economic growth path.

The media however reported only on COSATU's criticisms of other aspects of both speeches. These included the President's failure to mention the challenge of decent work, casualisation and labour broking, and his smuggling in of privatisation measures (IPPs) in the electricity-generating sector. We were critical of the Finance Minister's reaffirmation of the previous government's conservative inflation-targeting monetary policy, and the proposed wage subsidy for young workers.

This threatens to introduce a third tier of workers who will be employed on the basis of wage subsidies to their employers, which COSATU totally rejects. This policy roundly rejected and thrown out by the ANC National General Council in 2005 and thus is definitely not ANC policy. Thus this raises a question - who develop government policy if a roundly rejected policy finds itself back on the agenda through unilateral government announcements?

We are worried that despite progress registered over the past 16 years, we have not succeeded in placing our country on a firm foundation and on irreversible route to a new society. We are concerned that in addition to the apartheid political economy fault lines, our society is falling behind important aspects of development that should be corner stones and foundations of our new society.  In this regard we wish to highlight the following big concerns of COSATU.

Education

Education is the foundation on which all nations have liberated themselves, arguably more important than any other area of development.

Whilst we have made tremendous progress on many areas such as improving infrastructure, delivery of books, enrolment of children in particular the girl child, improving access by opening more no-fee schools, etc. we have not succeeded in transforming the education system in both quality and quantity.

The inequalities stubbornly remain in place. The poor's children remain trapped in inferior education with wholly inadequate infrastructure. 70% of our schools do not have libraries and 60% do not have laboratories. 60% of children are pushed out of the schooling system before they reach grade 12.

Of the 1 550 790 South African children who started school in 1998, only 551 940 of them registered for the matric class. That is a drop-out rate of 64%. Of these 551 940 who wrote matric exams, only 334 609 (60.6%) passed matric and just 109 697 achieved university entrance. That means that 1 216 181 of the original 1998 intake are left with no qualifications and, given the current rate of unemployment, no jobs, no hope and no future. No wonder 75% of all the unemployed are made up of those who are below the age of 35 years. No wonder why there is so much crime and other social ills such collapse of family values, HIV/AIDS, etc.

A good number of schools in the former blacks-only residential areas are dysfunctional with a complete collapse of discipline.

The children of the rich are in private schools. The children of the middle class who are now joined by a minority of blacks are in the former Model C schools. Both private and former Model C schools are in varying degrees far better than the schools where the working class's kids are attending.

In this context we warmly welcomed the selfless, heroic and revolutionary stance adopted by the SADTU leadership in its battle sometimes with its own structures and members to save generations of working class children from this unfolding tragedy. Recently SADTU sought not only to lead itself and other teacher unions but the society as well. We welcomed the statement of recommitment by SADTU, NAPTOSA and SAOU.

We have decided that for the sake our own children, and the generations to come to join hands with SADTU, NAPTOSA and SAOU and the Minister of Basic Education, Angie Motshekga who we also had an honour that she addressed the CEC to take the following steps and ensure that:

a. Absenteeism among educators will be addressed and it will be required of all educators to complete attendance registers.  

b. School management teams will complete and implement school timetables in the shortest possible time to ensure that schools can begin their academic programmes from the first formal day of the new school term;

c. Unacceptable and unprofessional conduct by educators will not be tolerated, and that their members cannot expect that the unions will protect guilty educators in an unquestionable manner;

d. Educators will strive to be positive role models to learners as well as in their respective communities;

e. School feeding schemes will be properly administered and managed in a transparent and equitable manner;

f. The appropriate LTSM will be provided to learners in the shortest time possible;

g. Educators will prepare for classes in a manner that can be expected of dedicated professional educators;

h. Educators will comply with their administrative responsibilities to ensure that schools and learners are not disadvantaged;

i. Educators and schools will enforce the appropriate codes of conduct at all schools to ensure that learners will abide by fair and equitable school rules; and

j. Educators will attend relevant in-service training courses regarding the curriculum and school management to ensure that they are able to teach and manage in the most effective manner.

Requisite support from educational authorities. No education system can show meaningful progress unless the bureaucracy provides the required support to educators and schools and the respective provincial departments of education provide the enabling environment that makes it possible for schools to provide quality education. If such support is absent, or is not of an acceptable standard, schools find it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to provide quality education.

We will campaign to ensure that workers who are the parents appreciate the critical role they can play in turning this situation around. In this regard we call on workers to stand for positions in the School Governing Bodies (SGBs), parents and learners, i.e. that SGBs will:

a. Empower themselves by attending appropriate training courses to be able to comply with their fiduciary duties and responsibilities towards the respective schools and school communities;

b. Provide the required support to schools and educators in a manner that will not intrude on the professional terrain of principals and educators;

c. That parents will -

• Register learners timeously;
• Ensure that learners will attend schools and comply with schools' codes of conduct;
• Comply with their financial obligations towards schools;
• Attend the required school functions; and
• Foster a climate of respect for education, schools and educators.

d. That learners will -

• Attend school conscientiously;
• Work studiously and continuously;
• Diligently abide by school rules at all times;
• Show the required respect to schools and educators.

Health

Only a healthy nation can be productive. Health is a critical measurement on whether progress to develop a nation is being registered. Our health system is in crisis.

1. South Africa's health status, measured by the United Nation's Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) indicators, is deteriorating. For example, maternal mortality has increased from 230 mothers per 100,000 dying in 2000 to 400 in 2005, with latest estimates of 575-623 deaths. The MDG target is 38. South Africa stands out internationally for the extent of the deterioration since 2000 when the MDGs were introduced.

2. This deterioration began well before 2000. Much of this deterioration is as a result of the HIV and AIDS pandemic, with 1,000 AIDs-related deaths per day in South Africa (and another 1,450 people becoming HIV infected each day). South Africa's death statistics, with the young and working age dying in droves, resembles a country in a terrible war.

3. It is estimated that at least 70% of the caseload in the public health system is now taken up by HIV/AIDS cases, crowding out the capacity to treat other medical conditions. Moreover, while we seem unable to treat more than half the 800,000 needing anti-retroviral treatment, that number is going to rise to 5,5 million within five years (these are people already HIV infected who will reach full-blown AIDS).

4. The public health system, facing this AIDS tsunami, is dysfunctional. While additional resources are required, South Africa performs worse than countries with far lower levels of per capita health expenditure. There is a disconnection between national policy and the allocation of resources, management information systems are insufficient for decision-making, and decision-making powers are generally incorrectly located (a hospital CEO doesn't meaningfully control staff, budget or procurement). There is clearly insufficient regulation of the private sector, though even this profitable sector is facing serious challenges.

Again, just as with everything else, this crisis discriminates according to race, gender and class. It is black people and the working class that face humiliation in dysfunctional public institutions whilst the rich and the middle class enjoy better resourced and health care in the private hospitals.

The November 2009 CEC (addressed by the Minister of Health, comrade Aaron Motsoaledi) had an intensive discussion on health challenges. We adopted the government ten-point plan and committed ourselves to play our role in ensuring we overcome this daunting health challenge. Our 2010 programme refocuses our movement to fight the HIV and AIDS epidemic.

The National Health Insurance scheme that is still to be introduced will go a long way in insuring that we transform health for the benefit of the majority. So far government has heroically defended the logic of the NHI against a systematic and well-orchestrated campaign of the right wing.

We are extremely concerned though that the government is giving in to capitalist pressures and is now prioritising the introduction of the Public-Private Partnerships which will lead to privatisation of the health services through the backdoor. We will act together with our communities and all those who are opposed to the privatisation of health care.

The point of this discussion and the aim of resurfacing the hard facts are to demonstrate that despite huge strides in the transformation of health to make it more accessible to our people, health, like education, remains a fault line inherited from the apartheid social ordering.

Crime and corruption  

We have spoken enough about these cousin brothers - crime, corruption, unemployment, underdevelopment and poverty.

Again, crime afflicts the working class more than it does the capitalist class and the middle strata. The workers employed by the labour brokers working for the restaurants and in the mushrooming mega shopping complexes tell frightening tales of robbery and rape they have to contend with daily when they knock off close to midnight without access to a safe, reliable and affordable transport system.

House breaking, petty crimes such as pick pocketing in the trains and other modes of transport, rape, theft, etc., are daily experiences of workers.

Our mass campaign against crime has not started despite the ANC supporting the campaign strongly. The promised street committees must be set up urgently to tackle this massive problem.

We, through our campaign with communities, will lead the campaign to establish street committees to combat crime. We will work with the police stations to establish community safety forums and ensure that our campaign never degenerates into vigilantism. We call on all organs of people's power to join the campaign to defeat this scourge. We cannot allow small elements to derail our hard fought freedoms.

The CEC insisted that the campaign against corruption and the culture of self-enrichment must be stepped up. Our 10th National Congress, called on the federation and the alliance to a much stronger stance against crass materialism and corruption including abuse of state power for narrow materialistic reasons.

The people of South Africa clearly share COSATU's deep concern that corruption, particularly the abuse of public office for private enrichment, is a cancer that is threatening the foundations of our democracy. It must be fought wherever it occurs, in the public and private sectors.

The large majority of public representatives and senior officials are honest and dedicated servants of the public and not involved in any form of corrupt activities. But for as long as a minority can get away with corrupt and fraudulent activities, it will undermine public confidence in all officials and the democratic system as a whole.

Some of the violent service delivery protests that have spread through some of our poorest communities have been triggered by the belief that the people's representatives have deserted the masses. This is why COSATU and its partners have to become more involved in these community campaigns

We have welcomed the strong stance the ANC has also taken against corruption. Its 2004 manifesto committed government to "ensure efficient functioning of all anti-corruption structures and systems including whistle-blowing, blacklisting of corrupt companies, implementation of laws to ensure exposure of, and action against, private sector corruption, and quicker processes to deal with any corrupt civil servants and public officials".

It is not good enough for ministers and public officials to hide behind the argument that they have ‘declared an interest' in the companies they and their family own. The fact that they are in business to make money creates an inevitable conflict of interest when they are legislating in parliament, a provincial legislature or municipal council.

We insist that all public representatives must be forced to choose whether they are servants of the public or in business to make profits. They cannot be both at the same time. The succession of corruption scandals and the spread of the capitalist culture of greed and self-enrichment are threatening to unravel the fabric of society and undermine all the great progress we have made.

This has never been just a problem in the public sector. The source of corruption is the very system of personal accumulation of wealth - the capitalist system itself, which corrupts and tempts public representatives.

A culture has taken root in our society which has lead to the obscene levels of salaries, bonuses and perks for top executives particularly in the private sector, which has led to South Africa becoming the most unequal society on earth.

A particular problem has been one we call ‘throwing the javelin', where politicians, public servants and unionists feather their nests while still in public service, by creating future business opportunities. They then leave the service to work in the same sector in a private company and profit from the opportunities they themselves had created as public servants.

COSATU is demanding at the very least a five-year cooling off period after public servants leave public office before they can take any such position in the private sector.

We are encouraged by overwhelming support the call we made for a ‘lifestyle audit' of senior public officials, to assist in the fight against corruption, has been overwhelmingly positive. We now want the life style audit to be conducted not only on the national government but to all provincial legislatures and local government. The audit is the only weapon to help us to identify, prosecute and punish those involved in corruption. We welcome the Minister of Finance's agreement with the principle and are happy that he intends to use "third-party information and targeted lifestyle audits" in his battle again tax evasion.

This call does not in any way suggest that all cabinet ministers and senior government officials are suspects. It is not intended to feed into racial stereotypes that all wealthy blacks should be investigated or undermining their right to be rich like their white counterparts. The call is directed to all cabinet ministers and senior public officials whether they are black or white.

We would hope that the vast majority of public officials would submit voluntarily to a lifestyle audit. COSATU leaders have already agreed that they would be happy to do so if this would lead to better cooperation from all. The big majority who have nothing to hide should be eager to prove that their lifestyles are consistent with the income they receive for doing their job and from no other underworld sources.

Suggestions have been made that COSATU's motives for raising the issue is part of a campaign to target political opponents. This is untrue. The fight against corruption has to target culprits regardless of their political affiliations or ideologies.

Accordingly we shall:

1. Call on all our structures to step up the battle against corruption. In this regard we will fight both white-collar crime in the private sector as well as in the public sector. We protect individual members who blow the whistle in line law who increasingly are becoming a target of intimidation by the powerful.

2. Convene a meeting of all civil society formations committed to the fight to end this scourge during 2010. It is in this conference that we will seek support for the demands of COSATU on javelin throwing, conflict of interest as a result of some of the people's representatives being businesspersons and people's representatives at the same time as well as for lifestyles audit.

3. Work with the government including police and the inter-ministerial task team that is doing the wonderful work within government.

4. Campaign for the return to the truly basic principle of selflessness embodied in the nature and culture of the ANC, as the progressive left-leaning liberation movement and ensure that we defeat selfishness, graft and crass materialism.

5. Isolate those who seek to transform the ANC into a vehicle for self-enrichment.

6. Campaign for the introduction of representative tender boards so that we reduce the temptation on the part of the political leaders and senior bureaucrats to rig and undermine systems for the benefit of their companies and those of their friends and families.

7. Campaign to ensure that the state develop capacity to provide services directly to communities instead of over-reliance on the private sector which opens the state to bribes and other corrupt practises.

8. Campaign to expose the tenderpreneurs who through political connections win tenders unfairly and provide shoddy services to communities whilst more genuine entrepreneurs are sidelined. Accordingly we shall monitor every tender issued to ensure that services reach our communities. For this to happen we shall ask government to publish all the companies who win government tenders after every tender has been concluded.

9. We expressed our dismay at the exposure by the City Press that SGL Engineering Projects won a tender then delivered exceedingly bad service and shoddy workmanship, which has left poor people high and dry, without the necessary services that they had been promised. While individuals who are not public representatives have a right to run a business, we insist that these must be genuine businesses and not a scheme to milk the public purse and in the process leave the poor without critical infrastructure.

10. The stories of the recent weeks beg a question as to whether our stance that public representatives should not be involved in business because of inherent conflict of interest should not be extended to all leaders of political formations. We call on the public to debate this.

11. We are extremely concerned that our country should not descend into a predator state where society accepts as a norm that state and its institutions are abused for personal gain including wealth accumulation. The examples of this include Angola, Nigeria and some parts of South America. This situation (predator state) means that society accepts the hierarchal order that when there is a kill (tender or government business) it is the first family who must feed first followed by all in the hierarchical order informed by the laws of the jungle, survival of the fittest and me-first mantra.

12. The CEC reject the call made in the January 8 statement that all municipal workers should be barred from being active in the political organisations. This is almost certainly unconstitutional and could set a very dangerous precedent for other public service workers. We will engage with the ANC on this matter so that we isolate the problem where senior local government officials abuse power and subvert and undermine processes.

13.  The CEC demanded the release of the report of the Task Team, which investigated corruption in the North West province.

Climate change

The CEC received a report on the Copenhagen Conference, which failed to adopt a radical programme or legally binding framework to address the crisis of global warming. The Copenhagen Accord failed to address the key elements contained in the trade union position.

South Africa is a coal-based economy and has the 20th highest level of carbon emissions in the world. COSATU will continue to campaign for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions while ensuring that economic growth and development are not compromised.

Alliance

COSATU remain firmly committed as ever to the Alliance. In this regard we reaffirm the correctness of the mandate we received from the workers' parliament in September 2009 that the Alliance remains relevant and a correct weapon we should use to effect fundamental transformation of our society. Contrary to the views held by the self appointed armchair analysts, the Alliance is not facing any crises.

However, there small right-wing tendency led by materialists and tenderpreneurs within the ANC leadership that we identified in the last November 2009 CEC which is working hard to take us back to the pre-Polokwane days.

This CEC reviewed these developments and concluded that the environment remains fluid and it is still too early to say that we have returned to those dark days. The new tendency is however trying hard to take us back to the politics of labelling, name calling, back-stabbing, rumour and scandal mongering, marginalisation and closure of space for free and democratic debates. COSATU rejects this style of politics and urge all of those who found themselves suck to this destructive politics and tendency to forthwith desist from causing so much harm to our movement.

The mainstream leaders of the ANC, who form the majority on the NEC, have not joined in the campaign. But there are worrying signs that the new tendency may have succeeded to at least muting most ANC leaders.

We have decided to launch a campaign to defend the legacy of the ANC, which is currently threatened by this small band of materialists hell-bent on using their positions to enrich itself and turn our state into a predator state. Accordingly we agreed to:

1. Reaffirm all the decisions of the November 2009 COSATU CEC as the correct interpretation of the challenges we face and the programme of action we should implement in 2010 and beyond.

2. Embark on a national campaign, implemented by every structure of the federation and coordinated at the national affiliate and federation level, to swell the ranks of the ANC and SACP and to defend our gains in particular at the policy level. In this regard we seek to recruit at least a quarter of the current 2 million members of the Federation to be active in the ANC and the SACP. Each affiliate shall in this regard develop a practical campaign to first recruit workers into COSATU and to the ANC and the SACP based on quotas informed by the size of each affiliate in each province.

3. Embark on a political education campaign, in line with objective one of the National Congress resolution, in order to ensure that only the most political and class conscious of our members participate in the ANC and the SACP. In this regard we recall the policy of the federation that all unions should spend at least 10% of their income on education and training.

4. To convene a major bilateral with the SACP with provincial leadership participation soonest in order to assess the current environment from a working class perspective. The summit of the foremost biggest and most organised forces of the working class must develop strategies and design appropriate responses to the current situation.

5. To hold another major bilateral with the ANCYL to finalise our discussions on our common approach to taking forward all the demands of the Freedom Charter, to develop a joint programme of action covering areas of mutual interest such as education, training, opposition to labour brokering, wage subsidies for the youth, crime, etc. and to finalise the discussions on lifestyle audits and in the process the style of engagement at the time of disagreements.

6. To continue engaging with the 16 government departments as agreed and to develop capacity and programmes to take forward all areas of agreement.

7. To defend all the leaders of the ANC in particular the President and the Secretary General who are currently the focus of systematic attack from the group referred to above. As we have said before this small group is impatient and is not even prepared for wait for the normal process of nomination and, given a space, they may move a vote of no confidence to those they regard as sitting ducks. We are aware of the mobilisation in some parts of the country by this small grouping to cause mayhem in the forthcoming ANC National General Council in September by testing of their ill-conceived plans informed by nothing else but to access power for a narrow accumulation agenda. We warn that their action may only plunge the ANC into unprecedented crises, which may destroy its unity and cohesion forever - something they don't care a damn about.

8. COSATU deplores the racist and bigoted attacks on President Jacob in the British tabloid media. They are an attack not on just one individual but on every South African. The CEC reaffirmed its full support for the President - who was democratically elected as President of both the ANC and the country - and condemns the British media and any people in South Africa who seek to get rid of the people's choice in pursuit of their right-wing agendas.

International

The meeting finalised plans for its intervention in the World congress of the International Trade union Confederation in June 2010.

The meeting saluted the COSATU contingent on the March to Gaza at the New Year, which was blocked by Egyptian security forces from completing its mission but made a big impact. The federation will be joining the march to the Israeli Embassy in Pretoria to mark International Israeli Apartheid Week tomorrow, 5 March 2010.

Issued by the Congress of South African Trade Unions, March 4 2010

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