Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) said workers should not forget that the Democratic Alliance (DA) mayoral candidate for Johannesburg, Herman Mashaba, was one of the vocal and enthusiastic funders of the Free Market Foundation (FMF) which it labelled as an ‘anti-workers crusade’.
The FMF is an independent public benefit organisation that promotes and fosters an open society, the rule of law, personal liberty, and economic and press freedom.
Cosatu national spokesperson Sizwe Pamla said the FMF was motivated by pure self-indulgence and profit maximisation and the argument that they wanted to create jobs was a farce. “All they want to is to crush workers’ collective strength so that the employers can reverse the hard-won gains of the workers and enslave them to a future of slave wages and destitution.
“What workers should not forget is that the DA mayoral candidate is one of the vocal spokespersons and enthusiastic funders of this anti-workers crusade. A vote for Herman Mashaba is a vote for anti-worker policies and for monopoly capital. Our call is for all workers to ensure that they do not vote against their interests.” Cosatu, which is part of the tripartite alliance with the African National Congress, stated that their message to the foundation was that they would push back against FMF’s offensive and will not allow workers to be left defenceless and exposed to merciless exploitation by marauding employers. “We are going to mobilise against this offensive and fight back to protect the workers,” Pamla said.
Cosatu said according to the FMF, bargaining councils were “private actors to whom the State cannot delegate powers of statutory regulation without violating the Constitution and, secondly, that the Labour Relations Act, by distorting the provisions of majority rule, permits a minority to coerce the majority into complying with standard sets of terms and conditions of employment”.
On 22 February, the FMF together with Mashaba will argue that Section 32 of the Labour Relations Act is unconstitutional when the government, bargaining councils, Cosatu and the FMF meet in the Pretoria High Court.
Section 32 currently provides that a collective agreement may not be extended unless a bargaining council has an effective procedure in place to deal with exemption applications by non-parties.
