South Africa: What would Chris Hani say today?

Zwelinzima Vavi writes: "[Hani] would have told those running around demanding to be elected at the next congress because they are young, that Walter Sisulu became the youngest ever secretary general not because he was young but because he was the finest leader of our movement."

I suspect he had this charatcer in mind:

Malema: Vavi 'must be put where he belongs'

Emsie Ferreira, Franschoek, Mail & Guardian, 30 October 2010

ANC Youth League president Julius Malema launched a stinging attack on Cosatu secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi on Friday night, saying the trade unionist must be cut down to size.

"The man must be put where he belongs," he told a fundraiser in Franschhoek that forms part of the youth league's 66th birthday celebrations.

His broadside was fuelled by Vavi's criticism of the lavish lifestyle of businessman Kenny Kunene.

"The workers have no interest in whether a young man throws a party or not. They're working in mines underground in difficult conditions.

"Helen Zille no longer has a job to do because a union leader is doing the job for her. It is opposition from within casting doubt on the credibility of his people's government."

Malema said there was no shame in being a black capitalist.

"They want you to remain poor and die poor, and once you've died poor people will see that there is no need to join this organisation.

"We have no reason to apologise. We are young. We will never apologise for partying. It is our responsibility."

Nationalisation

Malema reiterated a call for the state to control 60% of South Africa's mining resources.

He said those who objected to nationalisation were merely defending the interests of the Rupert family.

"When people say you are scaring investors they are just referring to one family in Stellenbosch. They call it investors but it's just one family."

Malema said the private sector need not fear plans to redistribute wealth.

"Forty percent will remain in private hands. We appreciate the role of private business people. You will still get something."

He was addressing a handful of local business people in the Western Cape hamlet.

Guests paid R10 000 a table to attend the event -- which started about three hours late -- according to ANC Western Cape organiser Millicent Tingwe.

It preceded an ANCYL rally in Stellenbosch on Saturday where Malema and President Jacob Zuma were due to share the stage. – Sapa

From: http://www.mg.co.za/article/2010-10-30-malema-vavi-must-be-put-where-he…

From http://www.politicsweb.co.za/politicsweb/view/politicsweb/en/page71619?…

A New Tendency of accumulators has arisen from the ashes in the ANC and the liberation movement and has begun a most reactionary anti-communist program. This New Tendency is in cahoots with the emergent black bourgeoisie. This Tendency is represented by those who played a role in the ousting of the 1996 class project in Polokwane.

Its locomotive is its unparalleled urge to accumulate through the state and the fact that it sees the national liberation movement as its vehicle to state institutions. It has brought with it a most backward and anti-democratic delinquent subculture in the movement, which is that of disruption of meetings if they do not go according to its wishes.

We are of the view that the New Tendency poses a strategic threat to the National Democratic Revolution. Counter-revolutionary activity takes place when some in the liberation movement conspire against the poor and working class. We call on all our structures to combat, isolate and defeat the New Tendency as part of their contribution to defeating counter-revolutionaries.

South African Communist Party

We are of the view that the SACP, like any organization is undergoing a process of development and renewal. As SASCO we are not entirely happy some approaches of the SACP on specific matters and we are willing to engage the Party on these. We call on those who have identified themselves as opponents of the SACP to reconsider their ways. We will do all in our capacity to defend and develop the SACP.

We will do all on our capacity to assist the SACP advance the struggle for Socialism in South Africa. We will organize an urgent meeting with the SACP in order to raise our dissatisfaction on specific matters, we
will not do that in public.

Declaration of the Civil Society Conference held on 27-28 October 2010, Boksburg

The Civil Society Conference held on 27-28 October 2010 was a historic turning point in the history of South Africa. Over 300 delegates from 56 mass-based civil society organisations, with a combined membership of millions of South Africans, came together to rebuild a strong, mass democratic movement which will work with the people and the government to tackle the massive social problems with which we are confronted.

South African citizens have a constitution and laws which give better guarantees of social justice, human rights and equality than almost anywhere else in the world. Yet in practice millions are denied these rights, especially socio-economic rights, in what has become the most unequal nation in the world.

The apartheid fault lines remain in place in employment, healthcare, education, housing, transport, and across the spectrum. A rich, mainly white, minority gets the lion's share of wealth and economic power, access to world class services in the private sector and a lifestyle amongst the most luxurious in the world.

The rich elite earn millions by exploiting the labour of the working class. A minority, including some of our own former comrades in public office, make their millions by corruptly manipulating opportunities to win tenders, bribing officials or using political connections

Meanwhile the mainly black poor majority suffer from deep and widespread poverty, huge levels of unemployment, pathetic levels of service delivery in healthcare and education, housing and transport, and little hope of escaping from a life of struggling to survive from day to day.

We are one of the most unequal countries in the world, and unless we mobilise for change, the levels of inequality will become entrenched.

The conference agreed that corruption goes to the heart of social justice and that as well as backing the government's efforts to investigate corruption allegations, we need a civil society anti-corruption mechanism should be a civil society owned initiative.

The conference debated three main areas:

1. Social justice

The conference agreed to the concept of a Social Justice Charter, which can be used as a campaigning tool to mobilise society, particularly workers and communities, around issues of social justice.

We have many good laws and policies, but implementation is lacking.
We must carry forward implementing real justice rather than stopping at passing laws and adopting policies on paper. Laws are often too complex in design and content and not accessible to ordinary people whom the law is supposed to protect.

Access to justice is unaffordable, so that those who can't afford to access the institutions of justice are excluded from exercising their rights and achieving social justice. The current system favours those who can afford to access judicial institutions and therefore creates barrier to access justice rather than promoting access.

The Charter can also help to mobilise and empower people on ethical issues, especially the fight against corruption in health care, local government, the education system and other key areas.

The Charter must trigger the implementation of existing policies and laws and assist poor communities to be aware of them. Any new Charter must speak to strategy and reflect civil society values. It can't simply repeat principles already in the Constitution but must expand on principles such as public participation to enforce social justice

It must reflect the duty of civil society to hold government accountable - to achieve social justice delivery, and acknowledge the fragmentation and weakness of our organisations, which has led to deepening of poverty in South Africa, while expressing the need for solidarity and unity of civil society.

The conference agreed that the Charter must be used to get municipalities to truly engage communities in public participation, ensuring that public broadcasting reflects the voice of the people and addressing related issues of economic and gender justice.

Delegates also agreed on the need to develop a communication strategy to build a coalition amongst social justice organisation working in different areas across the country to support each other's work and have a greater voice. There will be annual meetings of labour and civil society to take forward the social justice movement.

Refugees and immigrants must receive exactly the same standards of justice, not the appalling service many receive today.
Civil society must engage in public education on the Constitution to empower poor communities to fight for their rights and change the current balance of power.

2. Economic Growth

The delegates endorsed the COSATU Growth path for Full Employment document but agreed that it must be simplified and articulated in the vernacular so it serves as a weapon of empowerment for labour and the unemployed and a popular tool for the people.

Conference called for a broad political programme which will focus on the concrete, tilt the balance of forces and become a catalyst to drive change.

Conference urged COSATU to advance a social solidarity economy, particularly in regard to workers in the informal economy. Decent work programmes should be formalised, with workers dictating the agenda.

There is a need to strengthen the regulatory framework to regulate and improve working conditions, particularly in areas the retail, agricultural and hospitality sectors. Self-regulation by business is dangerous, particularly if we depend on external investment because of the revolving door between regulators and capital.

We support the creation of co-ops, but have to guard against fake co-ops, which are sometimes created to by-pass labour legislation, and to guard against disguised forms of exploitation.

Conference expressed concerns about the idea of a social pact. Workers should not be coerced into pacts with government or employers that will lead to lower wages or worse working conditions. It was also noted, however, that some pacts can be positive and that it is not the pacts in themselves that are problematic, but the potentially harmful content. We should be cautious about an across-the-board dismissal of social pacts as they are a reality in trade union work.

On labour market flexibility, it was noted that the government blames labour broking for unemployment, but continues to propose to regulate labour brokers. We need to run serious campaigns for banning of labour broking in order to facilitate job security.

The blacklisting of people by the credit bureaus needs to be addressed urgently because it is affecting unemployed people's ability to penetrate the job market.

The tax-GDP ratio in South Africa is far lower than other comparable countries. There is space to increase tax which could furnish the government with billions of rands more to implement important programmes, such as NHI, and help to eliminate inequality.

The document needs to be clearer on the idea of the "green economy" and sustainable development. We need to move towards sustainable energy, to migrate the economy from one based on a coal to a low carbon or possibly carbon-free economy. The renewable energy sector will grow, needing different skills and different locations. We have to make sure that we are in charge of this process and do not become the objects of it. We need to reduce carbon in the economy and increase zero-waste jobs.

We need an integrated, unified strategy if this notion is going to be made a reality, including lobbying and engaging with the private sector. We must build industrial townships linked to eco-agriculture and green buildings. Land development and housing programmes are of little use if they come without access to sustainable energy and water. Nuclear power must be explicitly rejected.

Water and electricity are the first conditions of growing the economy, therefore we must mandate to audit what is actually happening. Green jobs need to be expanded beyond households. It is very important for energy to be absorbed into the national grid.

There is a need to drive innovations that appeal to consumers so that they buy local goods.

The issue of gender needs to be stronger in the document. South Africa should take the lead in making policies and institutionalising gender equality and empowerment in the economy.

We shall oppose infrastructure development that only serves the rich, for example the high-speed train from Durban to Johannesburg.

We need increased transparency around the treasury and the use of public money. In this light we reject the Protection of Information Bill as it is incompatible with the right of access to information.

The document is quite strong on skills development but the new SETA landscape lacks detail. Employers must be forced to meet skills targets. There should be more specific skills training within employment, so that there can be greater mobility between work areas.

We must ensure that these inputs from labour and civil society gatherings are formally integrated into the COSATU document. There is a need for further joint COSATU-Civil Society meetings and institutions to fight corruption. The institutions must be fully resourced so that they are not just platforms of discussion, but bodies that have teeth.

Conference affirmed its support for a basic income grant to cater for those millions of the poor who do not qualify for the existing grants. It was agreed that policies must acknowledge the role of traditional leaders and the place of tradition culture in South Africa.

It was agreed that 2011 should be declared a year of mass mobilisation on economic policy and against unemployment, poverty and inequality.

3. Advancing Rights to Health and Education

Conference supported the National Health Insurance in principle, but expressed concerns regarding the model to be used, the implementation strategy and the many unknowns around the content of the NHI envisaged. We caution against an NHI bureaucracy that will become another feeding trough for the predatory elite. We call for government to publicly release an NHI policy to be discussed in an open and transparent manner.

While the NHI policy is developed, the Department of Health must continue to move forward on the Minister's 10 point plan in order to strengthen the public health care system in the interim and for when NHI begins to be rolled out.

Implementation of NHI must start in under-served areas where it is most needed and rolled out from there.

Community Health Workers are a critical component of public health care, but are exploited by the failure to respect their rights as workers. Community Health Workers must be formally brought into the health care system as employees of the Department of Health and unionised.

The Department of Health must fill all vacancies and stop the practice of freezing posts across the country as a cost curtailment measure.

Self-regulated, industrial- and sector-based healthcare facilities should be supported and strengthened by the NHI, not undermined.

While National Health Insurance is a necessary intervention, we must also combat the social determinants of health, including unemployment, poor housing, stress, alcohol abuse and poor education.

A campaigns committee should be formed that will co-ordinate the campaigns of labour and civil society around many of the questions that cannot be answered in the absence of a specific government plan on NHI.

Education is a cornerstone of any country, but the system in South Africa has been in crisis now for more than 10 years, with little improvement and insufficient attention from both government and civil society. Civil society has not sufficiently mobilised around education and too often even parents are uninvolved in the education of their children.

The conference agreed to a national campaign on education, to ensure the proper functioning and resourcing of schools, a National Fund for Education, funded by business, to improve the training of teachers and the curriculum. We are calling for all public representatives to enrol their children in public schools and to use public health institutions

The models for how we move the education system forward must be debated, for instance whether the Model C and private schools should be brought into a unitary public school system or allowed to co-exist.

There is no and there will not be a magic bullet that can resolve the problems in the education system as they are complex but the poor quality of the system and of teaching trap learners in a cycle of poverty and drag down the whole country by poorly preparing students for the working world.

To begin addressing the crisis in education, labour and civil society must rally together to build campaigns around:

* The urgency of infrastructure in schools - particularly at schools that are in crisis.
* The curriculum that will be taught to ensure that it produces adequate students with the learning they will need in the working world.
* Budget monitoring of the education department and the fair distribution of resources to urban and rural areas.
* Post-provision that is proper and re-distributive between areas that are relatively well resourced and those that are not.
* Better co-ordinated teacher development and training and ensuring that teachers, and other public-sector workers, are paid the salaries that they deserve.
* Civil society, trade unions, parents and learners must all be responsible for education. There must be an active campaign to attract parents into the school system and make sure that parents are taking an active role in the education of their children and the education system.
* Building a culture of learning and reading in South Africa.

Improving the governance of the school system.

It was agreed that Civil Society Conferences like this should be held annually and replicated in all provinces and regions within three months, and that a consolidated directory of civil society organisations be drawn up, with the first edito to be published in 2011, and that we help each other to access funding.

Conference agreed to support and campaign for the post-World Cup Declaration, launched by COSATU after the successful hosting of the 2010 World Cup, which will commit us all to:

1. Remain united behind Bafana Bafana other national teams and do everything possible to promote soccer, which remains the biggest and most popular sport, yet is seriously under-developed. We need to develop academies to hone the skills of unknown South African Peles, Drogbas and Ronaldos, who have no opportunity for their skills to be recognised.
2. Bring down the astronomical levels of unemployment, poverty and inequality, which blight our land. Even as we prepare to host the World Cup, jobs continued to disappear, inequalities continued to grow and poverty remain widespread after the World Cup. We need a new economic growth path that will help address these challenges with necessary urgency and speed.
3. Address the challenges of our education system. The 1-Goal Campaign and the Nelson Mandela Day celebrations offer an opportunity to take our international icon's dream to new heights. We call on government to prioritise building and refurbishing schools and to ensure that all schools receive adequate support from the education departments at all levels. We must move beyond the call for all to donate books and build school libraries on Nelson Mandela Day and run for 12 months until every school functions and is a centre of empowerment to build a new generation that can take our dreams to a new height.
4. Unite behind a goal of transforming our health system and implementing the National Health Insurance Scheme. We have to fix our public hospitals and defeat the scourge of HIV/AIDS to build a healthy nation and improve our country's life expectancy.
5. Address underdevelopment and poverty in rural areas. This campaign should address food insecurity and empower our people to use land that currently is misused, so that people can produce the food they need and escape from their deep levels of unemployment and poverty.
6. Lead a campaign against crime and corruption. We can build on the successes of the World Cup by sending out an unequivocal message that crime does not pay. Corruption is stealing from the poor to feed into narrow elites' selfish accumulation interests. Corruption kills the spirits of the majority, black and white, who want to work hard to build their country.
7. Mobilise to fix the energy challenge the country is facing. We need more action and not empty words to ensure that South Africa moves out of the current crisis. Imagine a day when thousands of activists move door-to-door handing over pamphlets to our people educating them about the benefits of saving electricity.
8. Mobilise to address the looming water shortage crises so that we do not wait for 2025 when the problem will be much more intense. Let us through our people hold the mine bosses who have been allowed after making billions to abandon their now empty mines and pollute our water. Let us defend our environment and keep our country beautiful and natural whilst also developing.
9. Mobilise the working class and educate them to appreciate that no matter how bad living conditions are, there can be no excuse for blaming fellow-Africans and other foreign nationals for the country's and continent's economic failures. Let us do everything possible to prevent a new outbreak of xenophobic attacks in some of our poorest communities. They are not the cause but the fellow victims of our unjust and unequal economic system. Workers and the poor must stand united against the common enemies of capitalist greed and corruption.
10. Lastly and most importantly, address the massive challenges of underdevelopment in the continent. Africa cannot succeed in developing its economies and transforming the lives of our people while it is still ravaged by poverty. Let us defeat the tyrants in Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Sudan and elsewhere whose refusal to vacate their positions and allow democracy means that can be no hope of Africa ever rising to ensure a coordinated effort to defeat under development. Let us mobilise to free our people in Western Sahara from their colonial masters!

The conference agreed that a timetable for action be drawn up for the implementation of all these campaigns.

Finally the Conference agreed to back the call by Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu on the Cape Town Symphony Orchestra to cancel their planned trip to apartheid Israel.

Cosatu criticises 'neo-liberal' budget
MATUMA LETSOALO AND MMANALEDI MATABOGE, M&G, 29 October 2010

Trade union federation Cosatu is not giving up on President Jacob Zuma -- at least for now. But the federation's top officials still had scorching words for this week's medium-term budget.

Cosatu's efforts to shape the debate on the country's new economic direction were dealt a major blow when Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan's budget and government's new growth path statement fell short of endorsing the federation's own economic-policy preferences.

But, in spite of the Zuma administration's repeated snubbing of the left's demands for radical changes to economic policy, Cosatu's two top officials this week expressed full confidence in the president.

Sdumo Dlamini, the federation's president, and Zwelinzima Vavi, its general secretary, also said they hoped government would include the alliance partners' proposals in its new growth path.

The proposals include slashing inflation targeting, reviewing the Reserve Bank's mandate and bringing strategic sectors of the economy under state ownership.

In an interview with the Mail & Guardian, Dlamini implied that though Zuma was the leader of both the government and the ANC, he was not in charge when it came to crucial policy decisions.

He blamed some within Zuma's Cabinet who "would stop at nothing to maintain the neo-liberal policies introduced by former president Thabo Mbeki".

Dlamini did not mention names, but Cosatu has in the past accused both Gordhan and Planning Minister Trevor Manuel of resisting the changes to government policies that the ANC's 2007 Polokwane resolutions prescribed. "Zuma is not even voting on policy matters," Dlamini said. "It would be unfair to judge him on what his Cabinet ministers say or do."

'Far better' than Mbeki
But Zuma is still "far better" than Mbeki, who "marginalised Cosatu and even the ANC", Dlamini said. "Unlike before, now there is consultation [with all alliance partners].

"We might not agree on whether the alliance or the ANC should be the centre of power, but we are happy with his [Zuma's] leadership. We do not regret our decision to support him as ANC president in 2007."

In spite of this week's setbacks, Vavi said he was still hopeful Cosatu would influence the new growth path when it discussed it with the government.

"The president has assured us that they will talk to us. We believe that they will listen and meet us halfway."

He said there was "no chance in a blue moon" that South Africa would create the promised 5 million jobs in 10 years promised in government's growth strategy if fiscal and monetary policies did not change.

"We like acting in tandem with countries that have far less poverty than us and yet we want to be good boys all the time," Vavi said.

"We should be boldly selfish. We are very good boys in the zoo and yet we are not gaining anything from that. We have political medals without the economic jewellery."

Cosatu will not sign any social pact that will introduce wage moderation as another way of helping to create jobs, as proposed in Gordhan's mini budget statement, Vavi said. "We can never, ever co-operate with anything that calls for moderation of workers' salaries. We will remain militant, we will continue to demand better wages."

Government must not force Cosatu "into the chicken and pig sacrifice where they decide to have breakfast and the chicken must donate an egg while the pig donates bacon", Vavi said. "It is immoral to even suggest that, because the pig will be dead for it to donate bacon."

'Neo-liberal politics'
Relaxing of exchange controls to encourage trade growth would be "a disaster", Vavi said, arguing that South Africa would be dumping the strategy that had saved the country from being ruined by the recession.

"I cannot believe these neo-liberal politics," he said, pointing out that Cosatu was "getting tired" of fighting the same battles with different government administrations.

Dlamini's show of confidence in the opinion of Zuma contrasts sharply with Thobile Ntola, the fiery president of teacher union Sadtu, who, earlier this month, blasted Zuma for failing to deliver on promises made to the poor.

Unlike other Cosatu leaders who want Zuma to serve a second term as ANC president, Ntola said no one, including Zuma, was guaranteed re-election at the ANC's elective conference in 2012.

"We will have to evaluate each and every ANC leader at the end of their term before we decide who needs to be re-elected," Ntola told the M&G.

Economic Development Minister Ebrahim Patel, a former union leader, told the M&G that Cosatu and business concerns were both considered in putting the growth-path policy together.

"We see both constituencies as vital to its success," he said. "The details of what all constituencies, including government, will need to do differently will be the subject of detailed and focused social dialogue."

On Dlamini's blaming of some Cabinet ministers for current economic policy, Zuma's spokesperson, Zizi Kodwa, said: "The president is part of the executive. The budget is a decision of a collective Cabinet that is chaired by the president."
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2.2 Vavi's high-life war hots up
Union boss is a hypocrite, says tycoon
By BONGANI MDAKANE, The Times, 29 October 2010

COSATU general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi has been given a taste of his own medicine after crossing swords with a wealthy Johannesburg businessman.

Last Thursday, Kenny Kunene spent R700, 000 on his 40th birthday party at the upmarket ZAR Lounge nightclub, which he owns.

His party featured models, who were painted grey, strutting around in lingerie.

Another model was draped on a table, and party-goers nibbled sushi served on her stomach.

Kunene's guests included presidential spokesman Zizi Kodwa, ANC Youth League president Julius Malema, Malema's spokesman, Floyd Shivambu, and socialite Khanyi Mbau.

The booze included Dom Pérignon, Cristal and Moët&Chandon champagnes, and Chivaz Regal whisky.

On Wednesday, at the Civil Society conference in Boksburg, Vavi lashed out at "the BEE types who blow up to R700, 000 in one night on parties", calling them members of the "predatory elite".

"I am told at one party sushi was served from the bodies of half-naked ladies.

"It is the sight of these parties, where the elite display their wealth, often secured by questionable methods, that turns my stomach."

In a strongly worded response, a furious Kunene said: "Your tongue is like a rap sheet from a police printer."

Kunene, who is a senior executive of Central Rand Gold mining company, is a former teacher who spent six years in the Free State's Grootvlei Prison for fraud. He denied being a "BEE type".

"I've never benefited from any BEE deal, I've never applied for nor won a tender, and I do no work for government. I am grateful that my businesses are successful, and they allow me to buy the same things that others may have had to be corrupt to buy," he said.

Kunene said if Vavi cared so much for the poor, he should stop wearing "high-collar designer shirts".

"Why don't you sell your house and live in a shack. Why don't you stop meeting in top-class restaurants to hold court on the suffering of the masses?

"You say that my so-called R700, 000 party is a 'corruption of morality' and that I'm 'spitting in the face of the poor'. I should not have to defend what I spend on a huge milestone in my life, when it's honest money and we were having honest fun.

"You are clearly no stranger to the good life, as you had a lavish wedding two years ago, with horse-drawn carriages no less."

Yesterday, Vavi said in an SMS that he had not seen Kunene's letter. "I have not seen that honestly. I don't even want to see it, nor do I want to have an exchange with him. I have more important things to do.

"Why do you want me to brawl with a pig in the mud. I can't do that."

Kunene responded, saying: "If he doesn't exchange words with me, why was my party important yesterday and today is not important?"

Although he didn't mention names on Wednesday, Vavi had scathing words for the party guests. "The corrupting morality [of] our public representatives is seen in these parties ...

"Next year, this elite will not go out door-to door to get out people to vote.

"But soon thereafter they will host victory parties to scavenge on the carcass of our people like the typical hyenas that they are."

Shivambu said yesterday said he did not "want to respond to sheer opportunism by individuals who are driven by jealousy and petty politics. If truth be told, the general secretary of Cosatu is obsessed with the leadership of the ANCYL, and is recurrently trying to portray everyone as corrupt," he said.

"But it looks like he's also provoking suspension from the ANC so that he can form his own political party."

Kunene said Vavi was jealous as he was not invited and Malema was. The trade unionist, he said, was "only too happy to attend Robert Gumede's R50-million wedding held in full view of the poorest of the poor". - Additional reporting Amukelani Chauke
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2.3 Vavi's sushi war hots up
Andile April, Sowetan, 29 October 2010
COSATU general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi must "go hang himself or go to hell". This is said by businessman Kenny Kunene in a scathing letter sent to Sowetan yesterday.

Kunene's outburst was triggered by Vavi's statement about political high-flyers who he says make him sick by spending their time eating sushi from the bodies of half-naked women.

Kunene, who co-owns ZAR Bar Lounge, an expensive nightspot in Sandton with business partner Gayton McKenzie, celebrated 40 years on October 21 at a party that was reported to have cost R700,000.

He also describes himself as an executive shareholder of mining company Rand Gold.

He said in his letter he spent more than R700,000 and he would have a follow-up party in Welkom this weekend to which "Vavi is not invited".

Kunene describes himself as self-made and does "not hide behind his wife's businesses like Vavi. Unlike you, who did not address me directly in your comments to the media".

In his letter, Kunene agrees with Vavi that there is corruption in the country. "There is cronyism, nepotism, bribery and everything else that rolls off your tongue like a rap sheet from a police printer."

But he distances himself from these social ills. "I'm grateful that my businesses are successful and they allow me to buy the same things that others may have had to be corrupt to buy. But just because a corrupt official bought a sports car, and I also bought a sports car doesn't imply I'm also corrupt."

Vavi responded: "I won't be dragged down the mud with Kunene. "People won't be able to tell the difference between me and him, so I won't stoop that low."

Free State-born Kunene says he has never benefitted from any BEE deal. His party was attended by the who's who of business, celebs, soccer players, Julius Malema and President Jacob Zuma's spokesperson Zizi Kodwa.

Kunene writes: "You say that my so-called R700,000 party is a 'corruption of morality' and that I'm spitting in the face of the poor. I should not have to defend what I spend on a huge milestone in my life, when it's honest money and we were having honest fun."
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2.4 You’re jealous, Vavi told

By Carien du Plessis, The Star, 29 October 2010

Business tycoon Kenny Kunene has told Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi to “go hang or go to hell” after the labour federation leader criticised Kunene’s R700 000 weekend birthday party.

An unapologetic Kunene replied in a two-and-a-half-page “open letter” to Vavi yesterday, saying Vavi had attacked him and his party because ANC Youth League president Julius Malema had been invited, and Vavi had not.

Kunene said Vavi would not be invited to the next party, either.

Malema “was there because he recognises excellence from black business people and, unlike you, he does not condemn wealth indiscriminately”, Kunene said. “He realises that the future greatness of this country lies in the hands of those of us willing to compete to be the best.”

But Kunene said Vavi was “only too happy” to attend the R50 million wedding of businessman Robert Gumede last month.

Vavi told a Cosatu and civil society conference on Wednesday that lavish parties like Kunene’s were “corrupting morality” and amounted to “spitting in the face of the poor”, which made him “sick”, Vavi said.

He also railed against sushi being served off the bodies of “half-naked ladies”, but Kunene did not address this in his reply.

Kunene said he wanted to “correct your misapprehension that my party cost R700 000. It cost more”.

He said he had made his money honestly and did not do business with the government.

Kunene added that Vavi himself had had a “lavish wedding two years ago, with horse-drawn carriages, no less”.

In his letter, he said he had been in prison in the 1980s for “supporting the Struggle so that no one would be able to tell me how to live my life”.

“If you care so much for the poor, then why don’t you stop wearing your high-collar designer shirts, sell your house and live in a shack, and stop meeting in top-class restaurants to hold court on the suffering of the masses?”

Kunene said he planned a “follow-up party” this weekend “for the underprivileged and poor, who are also part of my life, and always will be”.

Vavi, when showed the letter while attending the final day of the Cosatu civil society and labour conference yesterday, laughed at it, as well as the length of the reply. - The Mercury

November 2, 2010 -- The Congress of South African Trade Unions is shocked by the statement issued today, 2 November 2010, by the ANC’s National Working Committee, in response to the highly successful Civil Society Conference held last week.

The statement fails to understand the nature and role of civil society in the national democratic revolution and raises totally groundless fears of the formation of an ‘opposition block’.

COSATU and the other organisations (Treatment Action Campaign and Section 27) who planned the conference went out of their way to explain who would be invited, and agreed that no political parties would be invited, as this would undermine its status as a meeting of civil society and change the whole character of the conference.

Therefore the statement’s allegation that the decision not to invite the ANC and SACP was an attempt “to put a wedge between civil society formations, some unions, the ANC and its Government” is baseless.
(Incidentally, contrary to the ANC statement, SANCO was invited and did participate in the conference – anyone can view the attendance register of the conference)

COSATU remains firmly committed to its alliance with the ANC, SACP and SANCO, mandated by many National Congress resolutions. It has however also always been, and will remain, a trade union federation, independent of the ANC, the state and capital, with the right to meet and interact with any organisation, as long as this advances the interests of the working class. COSATU has no need to seek permission from anyone to meet and work with friendly pro-poor and pro-working class organisations.

The ANC in any case has nothing to fear from the views expressed at the Civil Society Conference. Indeed they should have been celebrating the fact that the main speeches and the final declaration were advocating the same policies as those of the ANC’s own 2007 Polokwane Conference, which were re-endorsed by the recent ANC National General Council.

In his keynote address, COSATU General Secretary, Zwelinzima Vavi stated quite categorically that “we are not an anti-ANC and anti-government coalition. We are not here to begin a process to form any political party, nor to advance the interest of any individual”.

This was echoed by COSATU President, Sidumo Dlamini, when he said that the conference agenda “is not meant to weaken the democratic movement, the alliance or the government. On the contrary it is meant to strengthen it. These organisations have learnt from their own struggles and victories about the benefits of working with the democratic government and to concurrently confront and challenge it when it cannot listen. It is true that out of over 300 delegates just one made a call for the formation of a Workers Party. Indeed there are a number of people who shared this view but the overwhelming majority of the delegates did not dissent from the views expressed by both the President and General Secretary of COSATU.

Contrary to the impression given by the ANC statement, speakers at the conference went out of their way to heap praise on the ANC government’s achievements and it is worth repeating them in full:

“We are encouraged by the knowledge and evidence that our government has the capacity to build millions of houses for the poor,” said Sidumo Dlamini. “We know that since 1994 households with access to potable water have increase from 64% to 97%, households with access to electricity have increased from 51% to 73% and that households with access to sanitation have increased from 50% to 77%”.

“In our 16 years of democracy we have achieved major advances”, said Zwelinzima Vavi. “We have a democratic Constitution and many laws, which have given South Africans basic rights, on paper at least, to freedom, dignity and equality.

“There have been significant important improvements in the lives of millions of our people. As examples: In 1996, only 3 million people had access to social grants; today the figure is 14 million. In 1996,
58% of the population had access to electricity; today the figure is
80%. In 1996, 62% of the population had access to running water; today the figure is 88%. We have built 3.1 million subsidised houses, giving shelter to over 15 million people.”

The ANC statements complains that “the government of the ANC was prosecuted and found guilty while in absentia for amongst other things of pursuing ‘neoliberal’ policies and not doing enough to ‘reverse the apartheid fault lines’ in relation to health, the economy, education, employment and unemployment and the rising inequality gap”.

Yet the ANC NGC resolution itself reached very similar conclusions, saying that, “Sixteen years into our democracy, while we have made substantial progress, we have not yet achieved true economic transformation, which should include fundamentally changing the structure of the economy and the distribution of wealth and income in our society... We have to achieve higher levels of growth and ensure that such growth benefits all of society, especially the poor”.

“The economic downturn saw the loss of over a million jobs in our country and job losses were continuing in the first six months of this year despite the return of economic growth. This has worsened what is an unacceptable level of joblessness in our country.

“These developments point to the core importance of redirecting and transforming economic growth, in order to bring about greater equity based on the creation of decent employment.”

The ANC also charges that Civil Society also found the government “guilty in absentia of inactivity in fighting corruption”. Again the NGC delegates shared the conference’s concerns, resolving that “we must implement the provisions of our election manifesto which state that politicians should not tamper with the adjudication of tenders. Basically we must not allow tenders to destroy the ANC”.

COSATU, and the overwhelming majority of civil society organisations, are fully committed to working with, not against the ANC and the government. United together, the liberation movement and civil society are an invincible force for change and national liberation. Let us unite and work together to achieve our shared aims!

Let us again state categorically that whilst COSATU is fully committed to the existence of the Alliance with the ANC, SACP and SANCO, COSATU is an independent organisation free to meet other unions and civil society formations and to pursue its own working class agenda as long as this will not undermine but deepen the NDR.

We are not going to respond to all other insinuations and questioning the bonafides of COSATU and its individual leaders, clearly targeted for smear campaigns. We engage on the basis of principle. To us the
2007 Polokwane conference of the ANC was about the burial of the tendencies to question bonafides, launch smear campaigns and use state institutions to deal with targeted individuals. Regrettably the ANC statement takes us back to those waters. We won’t cooperate.

Patrick Craven (National Spokesperson) Congress of South African Trade Unions
1-5 Leyds Cnr Biccard Streets Braamfontein
2017

P.O.Box 1019 Johannesburg
2017

Nov 2, 2010 11:51 PM|

http://www.timeslive.co.za/local/article741342.ece/ANC-is-paranoid

The rocky relationship between the ANC and Cosatu deteriorated further yesterday with the ruling party accusing its labour federation ally of ''being oppositionist''.

Cosatu boss Zwelinzima Vavi immediately hit back, charging that the ANC's leaders were "paranoid".

At issue was Cosatu's failure to invite the ANC and government representatives to a civil society conference last week on improving the lives of the poor.

A proposal that an alternative to the ANC, a party similar to the United Democratic Front, was shot down at the conference.

But the ANC's secretary-general, Gwede Mantashe, said the labour giant's actions suggested that it was adopting an "oppositionist" stance. He warned against attempts to effect a "regime change".

Briefing the media after yesterday's meeting of the ANC's national working committee, Mantashe said the ANC-led government had been ''prosecuted and found guilty. in absentia'' at the conference.

''We noted that the ANC, the SA Communist Party and SA National Civic Organisation were not invited, positioning the conference as an alternative block to the alliance.

''The argument that inviting the alliance partners would trigger a demand by other political parties to be invited is not a new argument but an argument that reactionary forces have always used,'' Mantashe said.

He said that, though the ANC believed that most Cosatu members had no intention of campaigning for a change in government, ''we nonetheless caution that any action like the one of leading a charge for the formation of, and for the mobilisation of, a mass civic movement outside of the alliance partners and the ANC might indeed be interpreted as initial steps for regime change in South Africa''.

Mantashe said Cosatu should convince the ANC that it had no intention of forming an alternative party.

Vavi fired back last night, accusing the ANC leadership of being "paranoid" in their interpretation of Cosatu's meeting with civil society bodies. He said the leadership's response was "shocking, inconsistent" and "incoherent".

"I honestly don't know what informs this paranoia on the part of the leadership," he told the SABC. "Cosatu went [to the conference] with the overwhelming majority of the people who participated very clear that we are not going there to form a workers' party or a new left-wing party or whatever."

Cosatu spokesman Patrick Craven reiterated that the ANC's accusations were "baseless". He said the party had nothing to fear from the views expressed at the conference and that Cosatu remained committed to the alliance.

"Cosatu has no need to seek permission from anyone to meet and work with friendly pro-poor and pro-working class organisations."

At the conference last week, Vavi said that the tolerance of Cosatu's members was wearing thin and that the struggle for the poor had not advanced since 1994.

He said the time for speeches was over and that [ordinary people] wanted their freedom back from the elite and from the rogue elements of society.

Mantashe said the ANC-led alliance remained strong. He said the ANC would continue to talk to Cosatu and that when there were disagreements there was an urgent need for engagement.

Relations between Cosatu and the ANC, though solid immediately after President Jacob Zuma's inauguration, quickly deteriorated when the federation sharply criticised the government for its handling of corruption.

This was followed by an ugly public fight between Vavi and ANC Youth League president Julius Malema, culminating in threats by some ANC leaders to bring disciplinary charges against Vavi.

************

Livid ANC warns on Cosatu’s ‘MDC bid’

Sam Mkokeli, Business Day, Johannesburg, 3 November 2010

RELATIONS in the tripartite alliance reached a new low yesterday, with the African National Congress (ANC) bitterly attacking the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and hinting that it was fuelling a Zimbabwe-style union-based opposition movement to bring about “regime change” in SA.

ANC secretary-general Gwede Mantashe said yesterday the ANC felt Cosatu’s Civil Society Conference held last week had taken an “oppositionist stance”.

While the ANC believed most Cosatu leaders had no intention of implementing “regime change” in SA, Mr Mantashe cautioned that the formation of a civil society movement outside the alliance was “interpreted as the initiation of regime change in SA”.

Mr Mantashe said the ANC had been “prosecuted and found guilty in absentia”.

The conference was seen as a step by Cosatu to test the waters before breaking out of the alliance, but Cosatu was at pains to stress it was not an anti-ANC front.

Mr Mantashe said the fact that some had raised the possibility of forming a workers’ party confirmed the “recycled idea of weakening, and ultimately dividing, the ANC and the alliance”.

“When COPE was formed, we raised the consistent efforts made in the region by powerful international forces to weaken the liberation movements.

“This was the process that preceded the formation of the Movement for Democratic Change in Zimbabwe and the Movement for Multiparty Democracy in Zambia,” he said.

Mr Mantashe said the ANC’s working committee, which met on Monday, was appalled by Mr Vavi’s reference to some leaders in the ANC as a “predator elite”.

Mr Vavi defended the decision to hold the conference, saying the ANC’s response showed it was being “paranoid”. Cosatu said Mr Mantashe failed to “understand the nature and role of civil society in the national democratic revolution and raises totally groundless fears of an opposition bloc”.

Mr Mantashe said the differences would be discussed at a meeting with Cosatu that will be convened urgently.

mkokelis@bdfm.co,za

From: http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/Content.aspx?id=125623