27 April 2000

The SACP leadership and membership brings fraternal greetings to this 10^th millennium congress of the National Union of Mineworkers. This Congress comes in the wake of one of the largest worker actions ever in our country. Over the last few months we have seen hundreds of thousands of workers coming out in the streets of all our major cities and towns to highlight the scourge of job losses and retrenchments.

The SACP wishes to state once more and quiet categorically its support for workers’ actions to focus the attention of the country on the question of job losses and the need to develop fresh strategies for job creation. No trade union worth its salt, nor a communist party worth the name, can sit on the sidelines and watch a market-driven economy throwing the workers into poverty. This action is a crucial component not only against retrenchments, but also in the broader struggles for the eradication of poverty in our country.

As the SACP we firmly reject all accusations that such struggles by workers are disruptive to our economy. There is nothing as disruptive to any economy than massive unemployment and poverty, which disrupts family life and deprives workers of their only means of livelihood. For instance it is not a proposed general strike by workers that is disruptive, but the ongoing investment strike by the bosses in this country. What is even more disruptive to our economy are retrenchments and hunger, as this weakens the capacity of the working class – the overwhelming majority of our people - to participate in the rebuilding of our economy.

To us as the SACP we think that this Congress should be used as an opportunity to focus on the concrete challenges facing the working class within the context of defending and deepening our democracy. It is for this reason that we believe the following are some of the key challenges facing the working class in the current period.

One of the biggest challenges facing our country is that of poverty. It is against this background that we should locate workers’ actions to defend their jobs. Despite significant progress and measures taken by the democratic government over the last 5-6 years, we still have extremely high levels of poverty associated with extreme inequalities.

The level of poverty in our country is such that about 57% of South Africa’s population live in poverty. And 95% of the poor are African, the majority of whom are women. A recent and widely quoted study of income distribution by an organisation known as WEFA shows that the poorest 40% of black households saw a drop of 20% in income between 1991 and 1996. In the same period, the proportion of black households among the richest 10% of households in SA more than doubled from 9% in 1991 to 22% in 1996. Because of the continuing job losses the African worker seems to have been the hardest hit during the transition, despite some gains in terms of progressive labour laws.

The foundation of poverty in our country is capitalism, whose historical character has been racial and gendered in a particular way. Therefore any attempt to transform our society without simultaneously analysing and tackling the contradictions of contemporary capitalism is bound to lead to a restructuring process that leaves the fundamental inequalities of our society intact. Again, no market economy will ever be able to resolve the kind of poverty facing our country. Any belief in such a solution is tantamount to a trickle down approach that does not understand the challenge of transformation in our country.

The ANC, together with the people, defeated apartheid. Since 1994, the ANC government has started to change South Africa for the better.

But the bosses do no want to see more and faster change. The bosses put pressure on our government to change its policies for their benefit. The bosses are an un-elected minority controlling the economy.

We must push ahead, speed up change and address problems facing us. There is still racism, violence against women, lack of decent and affordable housing, job losses and unemployment because capitalists, the bosses still control the economy. An ANC government is only a first step.

Job losses and unemployment

Job losses contribute to poverty. In fact job losses are becoming the single biggest contributor to continuing poverty in our country. The majority of the people depend on jobs for income. A job loss means being thrown into hunger, disease and ignorance.

Job losses affect women more than any group in society. Women’s unemployment is approximately 50% higher than that of men. Women occupy jobs easy to be removed or casualised. Unemployment puts more pressure on women as they do unpaid housework which increases the more workers are retrenched.

We want a job creating economy led by an active state, which intervenes in the economy.

• The SACP argues for the implementation of the resolutions of the 1998 Jobs Summit, in particular the convening of sectoral summits. For us as the SACP this is a crucial component of the way forward in stemming the job loss bloodbath. Indeed the NUM has set an important example in this regard that needs to be followed by other sectors.
• Employers should not be able to retrench workers easily. The SACP supports the COSATU demand that the Labour Relations Act be changed to make it compulsory for employers to negotiate retrenchments and explore other options with workers in full.
• The state can and does create jobs. Public works programmes for housing, water provision, maintenance and building of roads and literacy eradication can create jobs. We need a government led industrial strategy to help struggling industries to survive and develop new industries for job creation and meeting people’s needs.
• Parastatals like ESKOM, TRANSNET and TELKOM must remain in the hands of the state so that the state can use them to grow the economy, create jobs and meet the needs of the people for electricity, public transport and communication. Privatisation of our assets as a goal in itself will only add to more job losses and deny access to basic services for our people.
• The SACP calls for a review of the government’s economic policy in order to create jobs and boost public investments by government.
• We need to seriously consider the question of a basic income grant for unemployed people. A basic income grant will boost local economies and help our people to provide for their basic needs.

If our economy is shedding so many jobs the crucial challenge is to find ways and means of cushioning our people against the effects of job losses whilst simultaneously fighting to stem these retrenchments.

It looks as if the dominant thinking now is that we can grow our economy by suppressing legitimate workers’ interests thereby weakening the strength of particularly the revolutionary trade union movement. Once more, this is a market-driven as opposed to a socially and state driven approach to economic restructuring. In a society emerging with such deep inequalities and ravaged by poverty, an approach to economic development premised on smashing the power of the working class whilst strengthening the capitalist market will be unsustainable. The working class is being asked to solely bear the brunt of economic restructuring with the hope that it will at some later stage benefit. This is tantamount to throwing workers into poverty in order to fight poverty!

The third most critical challenge facing the working class is that of fighting the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Cde President let us not cheat ourselves, we know that AIDS kills, and that AIDS is caused by the HIV virus. There are more than 3,5 million people in South Africa living with HIV/AIDS. Many more die from preventable diseases caused by HIV/AIDS. People living with HIV/AIDS need care and support. HIV/AIDS will have an immense impact on families, communities, particularly the working class and the poor, the economy, the public health system and social services. Unless addressed urgently, HIV/AIDS can undermine our country.

Many people do not know enough about care, support and treatment for HIV/AIDS. Even many nurses and doctors do not know how to care for, and support people living with HIV/AIDS. People living with HIV/AIDS get TB, flu, and diarrhea very easily. But these sicknesses can be treated. For example, use of clean water reduces the chances of getting TB. Many workers and poor people do not have clean and safe water.

Other common infections affecting people living with HIV/AIDS can be treated with cheap and available medicines. But some of these medicines are not available. Most people cannot afford HIV/AIDS medicines. Medicines are very expensive in South Africa. We pay similar prices for medicines as in the USA. We pay more for medicines than Portugal or Spain. South Africa is very profitable for drug companies. How do drug companies justify making big profits in South Africa? Is this moral? Drug companies are blocking affordable medicines.

The SACP therefore says that it is time that the working class takes up the issue of HIV/AIDS as one of its central campaigns. This campaign is as important as the campaign against job losses, as it is a matter of life and death and about the future survival of our people. Coupled with this we need the working class to mobilize to put pressure on pharmaceutical companies to make drugs affordable. Imperialist interests are being placed above those of the poor people who are living with HIV/AIDS. Let us build HIV/AIDS task teams in every shaft and in every workplace. This campaign is too important to be left only to the NGOs. Organisations like the Treatment Action Campaign have done sterling work in this regard, but they cannot be left alone without our support. As a matter of fact the organisational strength and traditions of mass mobilisation of organised workers are important weapons that must be used in the fight against HIV/AIDS. The SACP calls on workers and unions to also support openness and tolerance towards people living HIV/AIDS.

Again in order to achieve these goals we need to roll back the capitalist market, and ensure that people are put before profits, and that tackling HIV/AIDS is put above the greed of the transnational corporations.

Underpinning the above tasks is the need for the working class to build its power to ensure the deepening of our democracy in favour of the working class and the poor. For more than two years the SACP has been warning of the dangers of a 30%-70% outcome to South Africa’s transition. We have expressed concern that we need to be vigilant that change is not reduced to the transfer of some power, privilege and wealth to an emergent black elite, while the underlying class, race and gender inequalities remain largely intact.

The very persistence of deep inequality in our country has been the wide-ranging restructuring of the working class over the past decade. There can be no viable democracy in the context of continuing and deepening economy injustices. As a country we continue to be faced with the legacy of racism. But we cannot really talk of eradicating racism in our country unless we defend the working class and the poor who constitute the majority of the people of our land.

The foundation of racism is capitalism. A market economy continues to reinforce racism and gender oppression. There can be no eradication of the legacy of racism without challenging its economic foundations - a market economy. Similarly we cannot eradicate racism outside of the context of the eradication of gender inequalities. The most affected victims of racism are African working class rural women, whose emancipation will be the true foundation of the eradication of racism. Gender oppression, class exploitation and racism are mutually reinforcing in our country. It is for this reason that it is the working class that should mobilise to be in the forefront of the fight against racism, otherwise any other form of deracialisation, outside of its class and gender contexts, will only benefit a small black elite.

It is for this reason that the working class should lead the most thorough democratisation of South African society. In concrete terms this means being in the forefront of building the ANC, development structures, school governing bodies, community policing forums as the true foundation of people’s power. The challenge of the labour movement is to ensure that its cadres are right there in the midst of these community struggles. Again a critical component of building people’s power is to ensure that the needs of our communities are not subjected to the whims of a capitalist market. It is for this reason that we also need a strong interventionist state. The role of the state should not be limited to moments where the market fails. In any case the market will always fail the working class and the poor. But the state should, in areas of basic social provision, seek to deliberately push back the market in order to address the needs of the overwhelming majority of our people.

A critical challenge for the working class in the current period is to effectively counter neo-liberal and capitalist ideology. We have perhaps not paid adequate attention to this issue. The NUM has of course gone some way in establishing institutions like the Elijah Barayi College as well as bursaries for children of mineworkers. But we need to build on this and ensure that the working class builds its own ideological institutions to challenge the ideology of the market.

As part of this we need to challenge public institutions like those in the area of broadcasting, research and information to reflect in their working the interests and aspirations of the working class and the poor. If the SABC daily shows the stock market prices but blacks out workers’ marches it is tantamount to taking a class side on the side of the bourgeoisie. That is why as the SACP we say we need to pay closer attention to the public broadcaster, amongst other things. In this regard we should be guided by the fact that it is only the working class that is best placed to advance its own struggles.

Underpinning the above struggles is a need to build a strong SACP rooted amongst the workers and the poor of this country. We need to return to our slogan of the early 1990’s of building SACP units in all shafts. The NUM took a lead in this regard, and we need to revive this programme.

This is based on the understanding that the building of socialism is intertwined with the current struggles, rather than some mechanical second stage. To build community and development forums controlled by the people, to challenge the capitalist market in the delivery of services, to have a mass based and working class led campaign against Aids, and to build alternative ideological institutions, are all part of building socialism on the terrain of deepening our democracy.

A concrete challenge is that of establishing socialist forums in our workplaces and make political education and discussion a reality amongst workers. As the SACP we have run extensive programmes together with the NUM, but we need to deepen this and take it to every shaft and workplace.

However in order to build a strong SACP, we also need to ensure a strong and united labour movement. The challenges faced by workers in the current period calls for the broadening of the current worker actions to include workers across all the federations. Such action should also act as the basis for attainment of one country, one giant federation. Let us not allow the boundaries of our federations to compromise the need for worker unity.

It is within the context of the above challenges that the revolutionary trade union movement should locate its role and tasks.

With these words we wish you a successful millennium congress!