The following editorial was originally published as part of the June-July 2022 issue of uManyano lwaBasebenzi.
As the ANC’s elective congress approaches, Jacob Zuma’s RET faction has launched its fightback campaign against Cyril Ramaphosa, charging him with money laundering, defeating the ends of justice and calling for him to step down as the president. This new cycle of accusations and counter-accusations has plunged the ruling party into new depths. Ramaphosa’s faction has lost its false moral ground as a ‘better devil’, which until now remained the only supposed distinction between #CR-22 and the RET. This can now add fuel to growing disillusionment in Ramaphosa’s regime.
The driving force of this disillusionment, however, is the regime’s failure to combat the skyrocketing cost of living, unemployment and crushing poverty, and belligerent bosses carrying out brutal restructurings, including 62% wage cuts at Clover.
It is clear to workers that bosses are fully exploiting the pandemic to restructure and bolster profits. The Oxfam report, Profiting from Pain, shows that the Covid-19 pandemic is one of “the best times in recorded history for the billionaire class”. The R300 million paycheck for Sibanye-Stillwater CEO Neal Froneman is a representation of the massive payouts for the bosses – dollar billionaires in Sub-Saharan Africa, saw their wealth increase by 15% in 2021. They take billions in profits whilst the 30% global increase in food prices will push 263 million more people into acute poverty – living on less than R30 a day. The strikes of workers in the engineering sector, Clover, and Sibanye gold mines demonstrate the anger of the working class.
As the contradictions of capitalism intensify, the global elite are trying to strengthen their influence and ability to extract profits. Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is an important feature of this – the attempt to secure Russia as an imperialist power in its mission to compete with Western imperialist forces like NATO in Europe and Africa. The working class is bearing the heaviest burden, through casualties in Ukraine and extreme price increases in necessities worldwide. The impact of war on the climate will also be felt.
The ANC government is trying to manoeuvre between western imperialism it heavily depends on, and Russian and Chinese imperialism, refusing to condemn Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. Their shameful foreign policy – failure to cut ties with Israel, continued economic ties with Saudi Arabia despite its war on Yemen, and lackadaisical attitude towards the ZANU-PF regime in Zimbabwe – exposes their class interests.
Here at home, they are imposing brutal austerity during a cost-of-living crisis. They insist on giving the unemployed R350 – R11.29 per day – against calls for a Basic Income Grant. Besides this, their mismanagement led to delays in payment of SRD grants in April and May. Having also disqualified around 11 million people from the grants, including migrants without South African IDs, they are scapegoating migrants and exploiting the desperation of the masses to whip up xenophobic sentiments.
Despite clear militancy in spirit, the working class is struggling to win concrete victories. One of the big limitations to recent struggles is that they are happening in isolation. The Clover strike, for example, succeeded in rallying support from the Palestinian and Left solidarity movements, and socialist public representatives like Mick Barry (MP in Ireland) and Kshama Sawant (City Councilmember in Seattle, USA), but the solidarity actions by the labour movement remained mere statements. Only CSAAWU dairy workers risked their jobs and picketed in solidarity.
In building solidarity in the fight for living wages, jobs and quality services, the power inherent in the working class must be leveraged – shutting down production, taking to the streets, putting material pressure on the ruling class. To win, this struggle must unite workers, the unemployed, youth and communities. Based on this perspective, we fully support the reconvention of the Working Class Summit and urge all working class organisations to actively take part in it as a basis for principled unity and to build a political alternative to the rotten capitalist parties.
Wage increases alone cannot solve the contradictions of capitalism. Only by the abolishment of capitalism and the socialist reorganisation of economy and society can sustainable improvement of the lives of everyone be assured. The reconvention of the working class movement must set out to build a mass workers’ party – for the working class to democratically organise a fight to replace the sick capitalist system with a socialist alternative. Such a fight is urgent. We think the Working Class Summit should start a campaign to assemble and prepare the forces for a mass workers’ party.
Amandla!
