Europe Solidaire Sans Frontières
“If we strike one by one, we will be defeated. […] And the discussion must be, ‘fix the economy, fix the economy, this growth path is going to reproduce this poverty, unemployment, and inequalities, fix that’.”
Amandla! interviewed Zwelinzima Vavi, SAFTU [South African Federation of Trade (...)
Women sit on the side of the road in Amalinda, East London, hoping to get work. photo: Thembela Ntongana
In most other countries the news that more than 10.2 million citizens are unemployed would lead to mass calls for the President and Finance minister’s resignations. Instead, the reality (...)
Disgruntled members from various unions marched through the streets of Pretoria to submit a memorandum of grievances at the Union Buildings, earlier today.
Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) commuters, members of the Federation of Unions of South Africa (FEDUSA) and the United (...)
There were protests galore in the build up to South Africa’s May 8 national elections, which coincided with the 25th anniversary of the people’s victory against Apartheid. Protests occurred in many parts of the country but predominately in Gauteng, the nation’s industrial heartland, and in the (...)
Senior ANC and alliance leaders say the politicisation of Eskom’s workforce will be a key challenge to any turnaround plan at the utility, in part because of the decision by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) to contest the 2019 election with its newly formed Socialist (...)
Protected from the rain and the sun by plastic sheets tied to sticks, dozens of muscle-bound youngsters apply their strength to making heavy metal cylinders turn. They are pieces of piping, soldered closed, or elongated gas canisters that end in a point and, at first glance, look like (...)
Metalworker union Numsa will today [Friday] file legal arguments in the Constitutional Court on behalf of 65 Dunlop factory workers from Howick, KwaZulu-Natal. The workers were dismissed in 2012 because they did not snitch on fellow workers during a protected strike.
The duty of workers to (...)
When the National Union of Metalworkers (Numsa) was expelled from Cosatu in 2014 it had a reputation for being independent and fiercely militant.
But critics of its secretary general, Irvin Jim, allege the union is drifting from its worker base and risks being captured by its investment arm (...)
South Africa is once again being rocked by protest and upheaval. President Cyril Ramaphosa, who took office on February 15, replacing Jacob Zuma, now faces a rebellion within the union movement over proposed changes to the labor laws that are viewed as giveaways to big business and an attack (...)
A Union In Transformation: An Assessment of NUMSA’s Attempt to Develop its Political and Organisational Independence, 2012-2016
A Case Study by Miriam Di Paola
It has been a momentous few years for the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA). Since 2014 it has survived the (...)
Towards A Powerful Value Chains Trade Union: NUMSA’s Expanded Scope
A Case Study by Chere Monaisa
South Africa’s workers are seeing their rights threatened by globalization. As supply chains spread and capital flows more easily across borders, employers have more opportunities to (...)
On 22 March 2016, the chair of Amadiba Crisis Committee (ACC), Mr Sikhosiphi ‘Bazooka’ Radebe, was assassinated. The murder investigation is blocked. We publish below an ACC press statement for it to be unblocked.
Radebe family and Amadiba Crisis Committee lawyers request intervention of (...)
Abstract
The paper evaluates progress made in the past three years regarding the implementation of the various resolutions adopted at the NUMSA (National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa) Special National Congress in December 2013, when the union withdrew its support from the ruling (...)
Abstract
This case study of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) analyses the union’s efforts to transform itself into a value chain-based union with the goal of meeting the challenges of globalizing capital. Toward this end, NUMSA would have to be able to organize and (...)
Opening address by Raymond Mnguni, Chairperson of the Steering Committee for the new trade union federation, 21 April 2017, Boksburg.
Comrade Chairperson, delegates, visitors and friends On behalf of the Steering Committee I welcome you all to this historic gathering.
It is a great honour (...)
Jay Naidoo was the first General Secretary of COSATU.
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When forming COSATU in the 1980’s, there were different elephants in the room, these different elephants had to learn to talk to each other in order to establish the launch of COSATU at the time.
In 2017, as the (...)
South Africa’s biggest trade union, the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa, will be holding its 10th National Congress from 12-15 December 2016 in Cape Town.
1. This ‘Workers’ Parliament’ could not be meeting at a more critical time for the world working class in general and the (...)
On Friday, November 7, 2014, the metalworkers’ union (340,000 members), NUMSA, was expelled from the national trade union federation, COSATU (Congress of South African Trade Unions) by 33 votes to 24 on the national executive committee. This is a significant event. First, because this union (...)
Democratic Left Front (DLF)
NUMSA’s Expulsion from COSATU - A sad day - a travesty of Justice
Dear Comrades and friends of the workers movement in South Africa
It is a terribly sad day. NUMSA was expelled in the early hours of this morning. For the record the vote was 33 to 24. As Andrew (...)
This speech was made by Irvin Jim, National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) General secretary to the the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) Central Executive Committee (EC) on 7 November 2014, before his union was expelled from the confederation. After meeting (...)
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