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COSATU in Gauteng re-commit its support to the African National Congress in the coming local government elections like we did from 1994. The ANC remains the only trusted party that has a track record on service delivery.

• When we asked the ANC to stop the implementation of the Taxation Amendment Act, they listened and stopped its implementation.
• When students demanded the zero percent increment for university fees the ANC listened and agreed to a zero percent fee increment in 2016.
• We demanded the National Health Insurance; the ANC today is no longer speaking about whether it should be implemented but the process of implementation.
• We demanded the comprehensive Social Security; the ANC government has today tabled the matter at NEDLAC for engagement by social partners.
• We demanded that the democratic government must use section 25 of the constitution to expropriate land and today the expropriation Bill has been passed by parliament.
• We demanded a legislated National Minimum Wage and today it is no longer whether it should be implemented or not, but the question is when.
• We demanded the extension of the UIF to other categories of workers, and as we speak the Unemployment Insurance Fund Amendment Bill has been passed into law extended to include domestic workers and seasonal farm workers. It will increase UIF benefits from 238 to 365 days.

Mayoral Candidates

We welcome and support all mayoral candidates in Gauteng. The decision on Mayoral candidates for the ANC rests with the ANC itself.

We call on our people to stop violent protest actions which include burning and destroying public property. It is wrong and counter revolutionary to destroy property built and provided out of people’s struggles and claim to be doing so in the name of advancing democratic right to protest .

We call on the ANC leadership at all levels to create a platform to listen to the concerns being raised by our people without allowing anarchy to rule the day and undermine the election campaign.    We cannot allow an inch for the DA, an organisation of bosses and employers, an organisation which wants to take worker’s rights to win the local government elections whilst we are busy fighting each other for positions.

The choice is between continuing to fight each other and celebrate short lived victories and to close ranks, unite and mobilise towards the victory of the ANC all over the country.

As COSATU in Gauteng, we are calling on all our members including all supporters of the ANC to close  ranks , unite and mobilise for the victory of the ANC.

We will work side by side with alliance partners to ensure a two third majority victory in all municipalities. We will go workplace to workplace, industry to industry, factory to factory, door to door street to street and office to office to canvass for the ANC in the coming local government elections.

The situation in Tshwane

We condemn what has been happening in Tshwane since Sunday, when the branches of the ANC were convened to be informed about the decision of the NEC of the ANC to nominate Thoko Didiza as the mayoral candidate of Tshwane and the subsequent violence, looting and act of crime after the name of Thoko Didiza was made public.

No amount of anarchy will resolve the problems of our people, instead it will bring pain and suffering to our people.

The first people who have felt  the negative impact of this violence has been workers who in the process were not protected and continued to be victimised y employers for not coming to worker or for arriving  late at work because of disturbances .  We appreciate the swift intervention by the ANC to restore peace and stability in Tshwane, Indeed the ANC LIVES, THE ANC LEADS.

We condemn high levels of spoils factionalism in Tshwane. We will engage with our alliance partner on the question of job creation because what had fuelled this violence is the high levels of unemployment, poverty and inequalities.

We also appreciate the role played by law enforcement agencies to quell the violence in the region, even under difficult circumstances. The law must take its course for all those tugs who take who have fuelled and planned the violence and destruction of property.
This has given our enemy space to infiltrate the movement and deepen divisions  and it must stop now !

Conclusion

We have started work in all regions in Gauteng, the Cluster Shop-Stewards Councils in West Rand, Tshwane and Johannesburg have been convened already and we will convene the Provincial Shopstewrads Council to finally prepare our Violet Sebone Brigade for the battle ahead.

We are ready for the two third majority victory of ANC in local government elections.

Issued by COSATU Gauteng