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IFP: Statement by Mangosuthu Buthelezi, Inkatha Freedom Party President, online letter (09/09/2013)

9th September 2013

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Dear friends and fellow South Africans,

When power cuts affected former President Nelson Mandela’s Houghton home
last week, it was inevitable that someone would comment on social media that
“now he knows what the squatters feel like”. It’s an unjust and insulting
comment, but not unexpected. The division between the haves and the
have-nots is an ever-present debate in South Africa.

Even DJ Fresh on 5FM questioned whether those in the suburbs have gone soft,
when we can’t go a day without electricity or running water. Many people
live in these very circumstances every day, having to fetch water from
rivers and make do with paraffin stoves to cook, at the risk of losing their
homes to fire, as happened in Diepsloot last week, and in countless other
places over many years.

The endless strikes we are experiencing, whether in the power sector or on
the mines, all come down to the standard of life people are able to sustain
on their income. As human beings though, we don’t only look at what we can
and cannot afford. We also look at what we perceive others to be able to
afford; and bitterness results.

Last week a representative of the National Union of Mineworkers went on
radio lamenting that miners are paid just R4 700 a month. That, he said, is
the amount that mine bosses spend on parking tickets in a month. It made me
realise that just as some of the rich are out of touch with the realities of
the poor, some of the poor are out of touch with the realities of the rich.

Where can we meet each other in the midst of the battle for resources? Do we
have any common ground?

Another commentator, on SAFM, pointed out that ours is still a capitalist
system. It’s about the employer paying enough to get the job done, no more
and no less. In a democracy, he said, the worker has a choice to take the
job or not.

But it’s not that simple in a country like ours, with widespread poverty and
millions unemployed. The potential exists for people to be abused simply
because they are desperate for an income. There is a responsibility on the
side of the employer.

At the same time, the labour cost must be sustainable to the business. If
labour’s wage increase demands are beyond what the business can sustain, it
will fold, and workers will be left unemployed.

The difficulty is that trade unionism in South Africa is a highly
politicised arena, with COSATU being an alliance partner of the ANC. Thus
there are always political agendas outside of pure market dynamics which
influence negotiations. Building on the back of entrenched inequalities and
lingering racial divisions, workers are led to believe that business can
sustain much higher wages, but simply doesn’t want to cut into the
shareholders’ slice.

Whether or not this is true in any specific instance, it is dangerous to
cultivate the perception that it is true across the board. Ours is a highly
emotionally charged environment, because people’s very lives depend on the
outcome of strikes, negotiations and sustained industry.

My mind goes back to the words of Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe, when he spoke to
us at the University of Fort Hare in October 1949, as President of the
Students’ Representative Council. He quoted Zik, saying, “Tell a man whose
house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell a man moderately to rescue
his wife from the arms of a ravisher; tell a mother to extricate gradually
her babe from the fire into which it has fallen. But do not ask me to use
moderation in a cause like the present.”

Many South Africans live from hand to mouth, and asking them to wait for
better wages, or wait for employment, is asking the impossible. As Minister
of Home Affairs for the first ten years in a democratic South Africa, I was
often confronted with the dilemma faced by refugees, asylum seekers and even
undocumented migrants, who are vulnerable to abuse because desperation
forces them to accept lower wages, dangerous work and appalling conditions.

Many South Africans, living in their own country, are equally vulnerable to
abuse.

Adding to the problem, rigid labour laws make it difficult to hire and fire,
making temporary arrangements far preferable to employers than permanent
positions. The intention of our labour law regime was to favour workers, who
had long been at the mercy of employers who held all the power. But the
laws’ lack of flexibility has created problems of its own.

The IFP has often called on the Minister of Labour to review our country’s
labour laws. Right from the start, I opposed the Labour Relations Act in
Cabinet and in Parliament, because of the excessive power it gave to trade
unions. Our then President Mbeki heeded my warnings and tasked the then
Deputy President Zuma with spearheading the revision of the Act, to create
greater flexibility in the labour market.

Of course, the trade unions vigorously opposed such revision and Deputy
President Zuma backed down. It was one among many times that Mr Zuma has
bowed to trade unions, to the detriment of our economy, our international
image and the stability of our labour market.

Undoubtedly, it would be in our country’s interests to see the tripartite
alliance of the ANC, SACP and COSATU end; and that end has been predicted
many times in the past because the alliance partners are so often at
loggerheads over the direction to be taken. But again last week, after a
meeting of the alliance partners to re-establish unity in the ranks, we
witnessed the damaging consequences of its continued survival.

It seems the National Development Plan, which every party across the board
embraced as a commendable blueprint for our country’s future, is no longer a
Government policy. It is now, at the behest of COSATU, a “living document”,
open to amendment and change. Once again, the ANC will give away our
country’s future rather than oppose the people who promise them power.

We cannot stand by and wait, in a cause like the present, for the alliance
to end or for the ANC to offer decisive leadership. It’s time to draw a line
under this chapter of our democracy, and give South Africa a new leadership,
beholden to no one but the people. We have a chance to do it in 2014. Let
your vote be your voice.

Yours in the service of our nation,


Prince Mangosuthu Buthelezi MP

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