1 May 2000

The SACP leadership and membership brings fraternal and revolutionary greetings to the workers of South Africa and the world on this fighting May Day 2000. May Day 2000 comes immediately after the massive commemoration of the 7^th anniversary of the assassination of that great leader of our people and the working class, Cde Chris Hani. If Chris Hani were alive he would be in the forefront of the struggles of the working class against job losses and poverty! This May Day also comes immediately after the celebration of the 6^th anniversary of the April 1994 democratic breakthrough and 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 by you, the workers of our country, is primarily for the eradication of poverty.

As the SACP we firmly reject all accusations that such struggles by workers is 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. It is for this reason that the SACP fully supports the proposed general strike on 10 May 2000.

As the SACP we also want to use this occasion to say that if the bosses and their lackeys believe that they are going to rebuild the economy of this country over the carcass of the working class, they are living in a fool’s paradise. Also, if the bosses and their political representatives believe that the struggle of the working class is going to end on May 10, we wish to warn them; they dare not underestimate the resilience and determination of South Africa’s working class to fight against the evils of capitalism. These actions by the working class are but the continuation of a long struggle to fight for the right to work and the right to a better life for all.

The working class and the poor of this country fought and defeated the apartheid regime. Without the struggles and sacrifices of South Africa’s working class there would be no democracy in South Africa today. Similarly, without a strong working class, there can be no sustainable political democracy in this country.

Today comrades, as the SACP we have come to say that we must use the current workers’ actions and today’s May Day celebrations to mobilise for the key political and economic challenges facing South Africa’s working class and the poor in the present period. In particular we must realise that this struggle is part of the overall historic political objective of the working class, to take the democratic revolution to its logical conclusion, a socialist South Africa. There are five major challenges facing the working class in our country today:

One of the biggest challenges facing our country is that of poverty. 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.

The foundation of poverty in our country is capitalism, whose historical character has been racial and gender oppression. 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 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.

Much as job losses affect everybody, men and women, but it is women more than any group in society that suffers more. Women’s unemployment is approximately 50% higher than that of men. Women occupy jobs easy to be removed or casualised. It is estimated that more than 40% of workers in the retail sector are casual workers, and most of these are women. Unemployment puts more pressure on women as they do unpaid housework, look after the sick, the elderly, and daily wipe the tears of the starving children in the informal settlements, townships and rural areas. Therefore a struggle against job losses is a struggle for gender equality!

The reality of poverty and job losses requires a fundamental rethink of our economic options for tackling poverty in our country. Those who are asking workers to make more sacrifices in a country where the majority lives in poverty are asking for the impossible. You cannot make sacrifices out of nothing. You need to have something in order to make any sacrifices.

We do not want a "beacon and egg" approach to economic transformation and development in our country, where the pig is supposed to sacrifice its life and the hen only to donate its eggs in order to make beacon and egg for the bosses. The working class is being asked to sacrifice its livelihood for the sake of the greed of the capitalist bosses. 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

It is for this reason that the SACP wants a job creating economy led by an active state, which intervenes in the economy.

• The SACP calls for the urgent implementation of the resolutions of the 1998 Jobs Summit, in particular the convening of sectoral summits. We call for the next three months to focus on sectoral summits and to convene, immediately thereafter, another job summit to evaluate progress and plan the way forward. For us as the SACP this is a crucial component of the way forward in stemming the job loss bloodbath.
• 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. In a poor country we cannot allow employers to retrench workers as they wish.
• Parastatals like ESKOM, TRANSNET, TELKOM and development agencies like the DBSA and IDC 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.
• In conjunction with a social plan, we need to seriously consider the question of a basic income grant for unemployed people, in order to cushion our people against the effects of job losses whilst simultaneously fighting to stem these retrenchments.
• We need to broaden our struggles beyond COSATU and mobilise the rest of organised workers into this campaign.

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 according to evidence available, 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.

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?

The SACP therefore says that it is time that the working class takes up the issue of HIV/AIDS as one of its central campaign. 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 as part of health and safety campaigns in every workplace. The SACP calls on workers and unions to also support openness and tolerance towards people living HIV/AIDS.

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.

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. 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.

This also calls for the working class to be 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 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. 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.

A critical component of the struggle for deepening democracy in favour of the working class and the poor is to challenge and monitor the performance of public institutions like the public broadcaster, independent commissions and research institutions. To what extent are these institutions carrying the message of the overwhelming majority of our people, the black working class and the poor? If the SABC daily shows the stock market prices but does not cover workers’ marches it is tantamount to taking a class side on the side of the bosses. We challenge the new SABC board to reposition the public broadcaster to be the champion of the interests of the overwhelming majority of our people and not to be a bosses broadcaster.

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 build SACP branches and units in all our workplaces. The SACP is the political vanguard of the working class, and organised workers need to ensure that this precious political organ of the working class is strengthened at all levels.

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.

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. We need maximum worker unity in the current period.

On this day we, South African communists, also extend our solidarity to the working class and the poor people of the whole world in our common struggles against capitalist globalisation. It is for this reason that we also wish to express our concerns about the situation in Zimbabwe. Yes, the land question needs to be resolved in Zimbabwe, in our country and the African continent as a whole, and that is why we also call upon Britain to honour its commitments in this regard. But at the same time the struggle in Zimbabwe is as much about the land question as it is about the deepening of democracy. As the SACP we are deeply concerned that a democratically elected government is turning a blind eye to illegal methods in pursuing what is otherwise a legitimate struggle, in a manner that might set a very negative precedent for the region as a whole. As the Deputy President of our country said, let our regional leadership listen to the genuine concerns of all the peoples of our region in order to effectively address the legacy of colonialism and neo-colonialism.

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