EDITORIAL COMMENT

This is the last edition of The Shopsteward for the year. By the time you read this, most workers will be preparing to go on annual leave and celebrate the dawn of the new millennium with their loved ones. However, while you are taking a well deserved break, you should remember that next year presents us as the organised working class with a host of new challenges. We urge all workers to carefully read this Shopsteward and use it as part of the preparations for next years’ programmes, as there are many important issues covered in this edition.

Most obvious is the report back from the Special National Congress held in August. It is the duty of every Shopsteward to familiarise themselves with the resolutions and discussions that took place at the Congress. Knowledge is power comrades, and you need to arm yourself with the tools of theory to take forward our struggles next year.

We also look at the issue of the public sector dispute. Even though this is no longer making news headlines, it is an important issue not just for public sector workers, but for the working class as a whole. You should read this analytical piece and we would welcome feedback and comment from all COSATU members.

We also report on the SACP strategy conference held in September. We have committed ourselves as COSATU to building the Party in order to advance our vision of a socialist future. We should again familiarise ourselves with the debates and resolutions of this conference so that we can go into our workplaces and build the Party.

Next year will be an extremely full one for all of us comrades. Perhaps most crucially, we will be going on a massive campaign around jobs and poverty. We are also heading for another Congress, some unions will be holding their own Congresses, we will need to start campaigning early for the local government elections, we will embark on the third Mass Recruitment Campaign for the Federation. All unions have been sent copies of the Campaigns Bulletin which outlines the programme for our major campaigns for the next six months (violence against women, jobs and HIV/AIDS). We are also holding workshops and distributing training manuals to Shopstewards so they can be empowered to lead this campaign. We put our faith in you comrades!

We realise this has been a very busy and full year for most of you. On behalf of the COSATU leadership I would like to personally thank each and every member of the Federation who has played an active role in advancing the working class struggle this year. From our massive victory in the June 2 elections, right to the end of the year and our campaigns on HIV/AIDS and Violence Against Women, you have not failed us. We have no doubt you will continue to lead our struggles and advance our victories well into the new millennium.

We are calling on all COSATU members and their friends and families, to support the Buy Local Campaign we have just launched. This should be a truly "Buy South African Christmas" in the spirit of saving jobs. So when you go out to do your Christmas shopping in the coming weeks, make sure you are supporting local industry and buying goods made in South Africa. It is after all part of our ethos of solidarity and supporting all workers in their struggle to save jobs and create more jobs.

I would like to take this opportunity to wish you and your loved ones a truly blessed and peaceful Festive Season. May you come back rested and inspired for the new year and the new millennium. COSATU will surely need your strength, your loyalty and your fighting spirit more than ever in the months to come!!

Willy Madisha
COSATU President

LETTERS

I support the SACP. I just want to say it is quite possible to control crime by working at a long term situation.

If the Land Affairs Department budget were increased, this money could be used to buy up vacant farms. Unemployed people and criminals could be settled on this land. The government should also provide seed and equipment and managers to run the farms.

Such a plan would result in:

• People creating jobs for themselves by selling their own produce.
• Growth points around these community farms.
• An end to the depopulation of the rural areas.

It will be gradual, but eventually...

R.J Seloltz
Potchestroom

I would like to express my genuine gratitude and appreciation for the ever improving and up to date information delivered in The Shopsteward.

Nowadays it is common to be asked by the opposing forces: " where does a comrade get ‘clever’?". In other words, the opposing forces are coming out of the closet and telling the truth about what they intended to do with Bantu education for the masses.

It is through learning material like The Shopsteward that today, comrades can and are writing and speaking. The last edition of The Shopsteward has once again taken the lead with new ways of seeing and doing.

Adult education is not about squeezing oneself into the nearest institution and soliciting a certificate in order to display oneself as an adult educator and making ‘big bucks’ in the process.

The things we learn as children do not necessarily design our destiny. We learn until death. We need to take adult education to the masses. If that can be done, the turn of the next century would be a turning point for our continent.

My proposal is an adult-based educational magazine. Comrades do write and are capable of reaching every corner of the continent. With dedication and commitment, we can succeed.

Let the comrades from the federation set another milestone in our history. Let us once more prove our cause to the nation as we have often done before.

Mandlakayise Mosco Xulu,
Education Branch Chairperson,
NUM - Harties G.M

I believe that the Tripartite Alliance led by the peoples’ liberation movement, the ANC, has done the right thing for all the people of South Africa.

By this I mean the democratic transformation of all the socio-economic and political structures which were initially based on apartheid principles.

Today, I have the right of freedom of association hence, I belong to SACCAWU. Indeed, this right is not only enshrined in our constitution, but also in the new LRA, which prevents all types of unfair labour practices. The Employment Equity Act also seeks to redress the imbalances of the past. A black worker need not be judged by the colour of her/his skin, but by what a person can deliver.

In terms of social delivery, our roads have been improved, my shack has electricity, rural people today are able to drink clean water from a tap. The ANC has delivered a lot in five years, whereas the NP failed to deliver in forty-six years of apartheid government.

Sipho Mashlane,
SACCAWU Witbank

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I am a first time reader and I am pleased by the content of your magazine. For workers, it is an ideal platform to air our grievances and experiences as far as the union and workplaces are concerned.

However, I am quite concerned about the non or less coverage of the concerns and experiences of the unemployed class. Workers, by virtue of being members of their union, are a privileged lot. There are many unemployed people out there, like myself, who could contribute to the discourse about transforming our labour market policies, the Jobs Summit etc.

The divisions which have grown between employed and unemployed workers are dangerous. We belong to the same class. The unemployed will less likely to scab if they were properly informed about worker struggles.

I and a group of my friends, also unemployed, follow what is happening on the labour front very closely. We engage in heated discussions on political, and social issues. Please could you send us back copies of The Shopsteward and other union publications to help us in these discussions.

Norman Ackerman.

Our article on Children's was printed in the last edition. We would like to share some of the lessons we learnt:

• it is important to work as a team and to involve everyone in the decisions;
• it helps when we organise ourselves into various committees with specific responsibilities;
• finance is essential for any campaign;
• a build-up of activities leading to a main event assists in popularisin and implementing the aims of the campaign;
• it is through these kinds of activities and campaigns that the issue of gender is popularised.

We hope these lessons will assist other regions and affiliate gender structures to build strong vibrant campaigns in the future