By Vedhan Singh
Winding down on Worker’s Month and fresh from South Africa’s most coveted election since 1994, I wage a war for workers by rebutting Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) President, Zingiswa Losi’s op-ed.
True to the adage ‘sing for your supper,’ Losi has coincidentally found her voice on the eve of elections in South Africa and during Worker’s Month. Her piece, “Our democracy was won through mass mobilisation, armed struggle,” simply cannot go without a rebuttal.
“We have much to celebrate,” she enthused. There is not much to celebrate and a whole lot to strive towards, because the very essentials needed to survive, to live a basic, simple and ordinary life, to buy a typical basket of consumer goods and services as the working class, are amiss under South Africa’s ANC of Ramaphosa government.
Daily, workers and citizens are equally suffering the same fate due to the shocking shift of poor service delivery in most places, to no service delivery at all.
The argument of “forgetting the sacrifices” put forward by Losi is obsolete and outdated. It lacks relevance and validity. On the backs of the struggle for the attainment of democracy, the real struggle is now, to liberate the citizens from the clutches of what is deemed to be a pure dictatorship. Losi refers to thousands who went through prison, detention, torture, execution, and exile.
The current ANC of Ramaphosa dictatorship seems to imprison presidents without trial, detain mayors without any evidence of wrongdoing and then delay their day in court, while torturing suspects in high-ranking cases to confess to crimes that they did not commit.
This dictatorship disguised as democracy dashes the dreams and desires, ambitions, aspirations, lives and livelihoods of the majority of Black South Africans and forces South African brains to exit the country as ‘the great brain drain.’
Losi, forget just for a minute about how our democracy was won, because that was 30 years ago, it was important then. What is important now is The People Reclaiming Their Birthright. Today, the mass uprisings are the people on the ground coming together collectively as The Spear of The Nation in a peaceful political formation that is poised to deliver a reclamation of their birthright.
It is a formation that is well co-ordinated, able to coalesce the Black masses on the ground with ease and organise them with military discipline. All the while, educating them about Black Consciousness and Pan-Africanism, and agitating them to reject oppression, separation, whiteness, white monopoly capital, the new world order, and the West.
Today, the struggle and resistance has created a political renaissance on the ground, there is a political rebirth and rejuvenation, people far and wide are reinvigorated and upbeat for the first time since 1994. They are infused with a new-found injection of inspiration and a cocktail shot of optimism for a six-month-old political party, the uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) Party, so popular that it already has millions signed up as members.
It is led by the ever-charismatic former President Jacob Zuma who is the people’s leader and continues to win the hearts and minds of patriotic and progressive South Africans across the board, borders, continent, BRICS+ nations, and developing world.
Today, the strikes in South Africa are the people ganging up against the ANC of Ramaphosa government, its corruption, cronyism, and its incapacity to deliver the most basic of services-like clean water, refuse collection and streetlighting-that the people are paying for but are not receiving.
There is a government backlash by hordes of ratepayers, community and civil society actors and activists. The international solidarity today is overseas media finally writing about the Cyril Ramaphosa’s Phala Phala Farmgate Scandal without fear or favour, and about how he has a case to answer.
Losi alludes to “some asking what have we achieved” – it’s not some who are asking, the majority of South Africans who matter are asking. Social media platforms are awash with the voices of Black South Africans in first person, literally from their own fingertips and in their own language probing what the ANC of Ramaphosa government has done.
Losi, please refrain from telling us about you supposedly winning, stumbling, and having much to do. The claim that you have won simply cannot be substantiated. Poverty is thriving today under the ANC of Ramaphosa government. Losi and her ANC of Ramaphosa have not stumbled, they have fallen flat on their face.
Losi’s ANC of Ramaphosa was given a chance. And during the Ramaphosa presidency the lives of workers and citizens have generally not changed for the better and have been stagnant, or in the main, gotten worse. The masses are living in poverty and not prosperity. Wages are a pittance and not progressive. Under the ANC of Ramaphosa, there is simply nothing good to write home about.
If Losi states that she is “proud of the strides made under the leadership of the ANC,” then her level of pride is shocking. Because under the ANC of Ramaphosa, black people have suffered the most. From the struggle to put food on the table, loss of employment and having no land to call home.
Losi goes on to utter that “no sane person questions the capacity of the IEC.” This statement is far-fetched and false. Daily, throngs of sane and sober South Africans – both online and in-person – question the antics and actions of the IEC in never before seen behaviour by a purported independent electoral commission in a democratic state, who, instead of focusing on its readiness to hold successful elections and thus dropping the ball, is running from court to court playing player, goal keeper, referee and linesperson.
Judicial encroachment is denounced by Losi, could it be that she missed the memo on the sealing of Ramaphosa’s presidential campaign bank statements under her belief of “holding the most powerful accountable.” Is this high-level accountability rubberstamped by him as he has also kept sealed the performance appraisal of his cabinet?
It appears that Losi is out of touch with trade union activities on the ground. In certain municipal settings for instance, some trade union leaders find themselves fired or having their lives threatened by some bosses within the local government political or administrative leadership. In such cases, where is the possibility of being able to elevate to any higher office, unless you dance to the tune of the local government bosses who engage in such practices.
Losi has clearly not seen the payslips of Expanded Public Works Programme, Presidential Employment Programme and other similar labourers across the country, then she may understand what it means to be a “slave” and how these workers are not protected by the “progressive labour laws” that she makes reference to.
The rights that workers have today are rightly so, worker’s rights. It is the rights that they so rightly deserve and have fought for. Workers fight for equal pay. Workers fight for minimum wage. Workers fight to work in a safe environment. Workers fight for leave, UIF and workplace compensation for injuries. Nothing has been handed out on a silver platter by the ANC of Ramaphosa government.
The legacy of apartheid and discrimination is very much alive and well today under the ANC of Ramaphosa. All you have to do is look at the wage gap between what a CEO is paid versus what an ordinary worker is paid. Nedbank CEO – R92.5 million, FNB CEO – R44.5 million, ABSA CEO – R40.03 million. Nedbank’s lowest paid worker earns R225 000, and FNB’s lowest paid worker earns R198 500. All these CEOs are white male – a trademark of the ANC of Ramaphosa, himself a poster boy for particular privileged pale-toned persons.
Losi further touches on free schooling as a blanket statement. Not all schools are free, it depends which quintile the school belongs to in order to qualify for certain subsidised state benefits. ‘Free meals are provided?’ How about some school children in KwaZulu-Natal who go hungry in school at the hands of the ANC of Ramaphosa government. “Millions have access to tertiary education,” which millions? Many of the millions of students that NSFAS cannot pay allowances to?
Pregnant mothers may have free healthcare, but is that quality healthcare? Under this ANC of Ramaphosa administration, medio-legal claims stand at R23.6 billion for the past four years only.
As at 2023 unemployment in South Africa under the ANC of Ramaphosa stands as the highest in the world. According to Losi 27 million grants may be paid, but these are unliveable grants, juxtaposted against CPI and inflation in the country.
The ANC of Ramaphosa government has not provided enough housing, hence during his regime informal settlements have mushroomed up all over the place. There are certain communities in the country without water for years. Load shedding under Ramaphosa’s rule continues to be the worst than under president Zuma.
Cyril has failed in crises. It is widely believed that the ANC of Ramaphosa administration squandered and stole R500-billion Covid-19 relief funds. Some people say that his administration is solely responsible for the hundreds of lives lost during the Phoenix Massacre.
Some workers say that his administration, despite having the South African Weather Services and other similar state entities, repeatedly fail in having a functional early warning and rapid response framework for natural disasters, including the floods that ravaged KwaZulu-Natal and devastated its industries and economy.
Ramaphosa has been nowhere on the ground whenever there are disasters, he only shows up for media mileage when the storm passes and the dust has settled.
“State capture” and corruption did take place under Ramaphosa’s deputy presidency. Today he is the president, and under his presidency some of the same leaders tainted as being part of state capture remain in the Ramaphosa regime and are actively leading his ‘new dawn’.
Losi, your stance on accountability is selective. This can be seen in your own Ramaphosa who has been found as having a case to answer for Phala Phala and getting off a free man. He is also accused of the Marikana Massacre. In terms of just these two aspects, where is the accountability that you keeping referring to?
Ramaphosa implemented a hard lockdown on the country and essentially the economy, a mechanism which lacked merit and went on to affect the economy in an unprecedented way. During this time, certain soldiers even exercised uncalled-for force which harmed and led to the death of many harmless citizens.
“We dispensed R65 billion to help 5.7 million workers,” is Losi taking into account the lack of a full-proof systems to prevent fraud and corruption by certain employers who looted Covid-19 funds meant for poor workers? Losi, the two-pot pension reform remains a dream. Your Ramaphosa has become complacent in unemployment, hence the upward trajectory from the start of his presidency.
As a woman you should be ashamed that sexual and gender-based violence and femicide under the Ramaphosa regime have sadly and shockingly become akin to a national sport in the country. Your statement, “We dare not normalise shameful levels of crime and gender-based violence” is patronising. Obsequious to this scourge, in the People’s Mandate of the MK Party claims that it will ensure that each police station has a well-resourced specialised unit dedicated to the investigation of gender-based crimes. It will also hold a referendum on the death penalty, it says.
Our current challenges require a new political administration, not the one that we have had since the dawn of democracy, which has been oppressing and discriminating both the working class and the citizens under the ANC of Ramaphosa government. It appears that Losi is living a lie in a fantasy world. It remains to be seen whether the workers and citizens collectively joined hands in rejecting the ANC of Ramaphosa at the polls on May 29.
Vedhan Singh is a commentator on South African politics, human rights and socio-economic issues. He writes in his own capacity and this publication holds no liability.
