COSATU Statement 06 - 01 - 06

Cabinet Statement

The Congress of South African Trade Unions has noted the Cabinet statement of 31 May 2006, and its comments on "statements made during the course of last week about the character of our democracy and the place and role of The Presidency in its evolution".

COSATU stands firm and will not back off from the assertions and political observations made by its Central Executive Committee, including the concern it expressed that there are "signs that we may be drifting towards dictatorship. This appears in the use of state institutions in the narrow factional fights. We see it in the use of sections of the media to assassinate the character of individuals through off-the-record briefings and the leaking of sensitive information in the hands of those charged to investigate crimes."

COSATU is not surprised at all by the statement of cabinet and business rejecting this assertion. Of course those who enjoy the power they have accumulated as a result of undemocratic practises will see nothing wrong with this. Business, who has been the main beneficiary of the transformation of the economy for the past twelve years, will see nothing wrong with the marginalisation of the alliance and the generally 'low-intensity' democracy. They have benefited immensely from the status quo.

COSATU welcomes the ANC NEC's invitation to discuss these matters with them and will not comment further until this discussion has taken place, except to say that the federation stands by every word of the statement of its Central Executive Committee dated 25 May.

Lastly COSATU wishes to clarify that nowhere in that statement, nor in any subsequent comments by the COSATU leadership, has there been any reference to President Thabo Mbeki or the ANC. We condemn attempts by the media and others to personalise and sensationalise the serious issues we are raising by falsely suggesting that the statement was some kind of attack on the President Mbeki as a person. Equally we condemn the SABC's deliberate misrepresentation of the interview it did with ANC Secretary General, Kgalema Motlanthe.

At no stage has the ANC Secretary General called on the alliance to "refrain from making baseless statements". These words in quotes are the work of innovative SABC editors pursuing their own political agendas. If anything the ANC NEC statement and the ANC Secretary General reaffirmed the right of COSATU and the SACP to think and to hold independent views. This is something that the SABC editors are slowly and voluntarily giving up.