04 May 2001
The South African Communist Party (SACP) calls on all poor and working South Africans to full support the march on the restructuring of Telkom and the SA Post Office to be led by the Communication Worker's Union in Pretoria tomorrow and the campaign proposed by COSATU on privatisation.
This march and campaign point to the need for government and the ANC-SACP-COSATU alliance to conduct an urgent and comprehensive review of all restructuring of state assets which has taken place all throughout the public sector including national parastatals, provincial parastatals, local government and the public service as a whole. Unless and until there is a full debate and agreement, the issue of restructuring of state assets is going to continue causing problems. Therefore the march by CWU and the campaign proposed by COSATU is an urgent call to the alliance to meet as a matter urgency to iron out a common approach to economic transformation and the restructuring of state assets.
Therefore the SACP specifically calls for this urgent and comprehensive review which must be part of broader discussions on an appropriate economic growth and development path for our country.
We are making these calls because as the SACP, over the last few years, we have been concerned and warned about a number of realities regarding the restructuring of state assets.
RESTRUCTURING OF STATE ASSETS DOES NOT MEAN PRIVATISATION
First of all, we have always stressed the need for the management of state owned assets to abide by the National Framework Agreement. Our experience has been that the managers of many of these assets have imposed restructuring without any meaningful consultation and participation by workers.
Secondly, as the SACP we have consistently called for a strategic debate on economic transformation which would be premised on a state-led industrial strategy. Part of this debate would also be to identify sectors of the economy where the state must play a leading role in order that any restructuring in such sectors strengthens the state and its service delivery obligations. To this extent the SACP argues that the following sectors must remain in public hands - education, health, water, municipal services, central banking, development finance, transport, communications, electricity supply, energy including liquid fuels, mineral rights and housing.
Thirdly, the SACP has argued and struggled for popular participation in economic transformation and the socialisation of the predominant part of the economy. The CWU march and proposed COSATYU campaign on privatisation as important contributions to a popular debate and discussion on economic transformation.
PRIVATISATION UNDERMINES WORKERS AND POOR PEOPLE
Members of CWU and many South African workers have already experienced the dangers of privatisation. The results, as we see almost inevitably with privatisation, have been both job losses and worse services for the poor. In the past three years, we have seen the loss of 17 000 jobs just in Telkom alone.
According to the government's own statistics, in the October Household Survey, in 1999 less than a third of African urban households and less than one in ten African rural households had telephones, compared to over 80 per cent of rural and urban whites.
That is why the ANC-SACP-COSATU Alliance has always called for a strong developmental state, which directs and transforms the economy in favour of poor and working people. We must struggle against neo-liberal conceptions of running down the state. It is simply untrue that the only way to engage with the private sector is through privatisation. The SACP argues for the rolling back of private capital in our economy.
Therefore this COSATU campaign is not only about protecting jobs. It is also about ensuring that key and strategic economic assets owned by the state are not sold off to the private sector. Public ownership is very important in delivering services and meeting the basic needs of all our people who will be cut off from basic services once private owners lay their hands on state assets.
CONTACT
Mazibuko K. Jara (surname Jara)
Department of Media, Information and Publicity South African Communist Party
Tel - 011 339-3621/2
Fax - 011 339-4244
Cell: 083 651 0271
Email - sacp1@wn.apc.org