M'afrika
The 'strange breed' leadership in the Cosatu formation of labour unions have
egg on their faces now, after the strike. Lesiba Seshoka and Frans Baleni were
vehemently opposed to the demands of the workers, and they stood squarely
behind the police shootings. They also refused - along with the Minister of
Labour and the State President - to allow the new union leading the strike a
seat at the negotiation forum. The workers chose their own 'independent'
representatives (obviously from AMCU) to stand for their interests. The NUM
will suffer major losses. Mine workers are withdrawing from the compulsory
debit order subscription for union membership. The NUM's political credibility
has gone down the sewer drain.
I believe they have a conflict of interest. Their union has become a corporate
entity, and they have cozy relations with the ruling elite. Their game of
hunting with the hounds and running with the hares has come to an end. Their
material condition and their mindset is flawed such that they have
strategically drifted from the environment and gone astray from their own
purpose to protect the interest of workers. The ruling elite has much the same
condition. Read the following article on the current ANC misfortunes as a case
study: http://socli/QqrPvlU - the strange breed leadership fits the adage,
"Whom the gods shall destroy, they first make mad."
In political theory there is the concept of the cultural web. The paradigm in
which one operates is the objective conditions you have to come to terms with,
and lays the environment with linkages to the behavioural, physical and
symbolic manifestations of a culture. This paradigm is the collective
experience reinforced in rituals and routines of a people, their stories about
heroes and mythical figures, their symbols to convey meaning over and above
their functional purpose, their power structures and their control systems, and
their organisational structures. Any type of leadership that fails to consider
the objective conditions in which they operate will suffer the drift away from
their realities, and fail their mission. The ANC and their surrogates in the
labour unions are suffering delusions of grandeur.
Their literal mentality to take the carrying of knob kieries, pangas, sjamboks
and axes as a declaration of real war exposes their reactionary status. These
symbols are offered to family elders during lobola and umembeso rituals. If
there is a crisis the men (and women) are supposed to carry these items to the
meetings and to social gatherings. You therefore do not expect African leaders
who are supposed to be in touch with the realities of their constituencies to
renege on their own cultural web. The police should have focused on the
criminals who are always a tiny grouping and isolated from the mass drive for
raised wages. Gwede Mantashe is a pseudo marxist who is bordering on the
vulgarisation of the doctrine. He claims the leaders of the strike were
depending on what the traditional healer is sayings. This is bull - like the
buffalo that Cyril is said to have bought on auction. There are charlatans in
the space of sangomas, and the people know this. Just like Sobukwe warned us to
be wary of 'captured' leaders.
Citizens are not valued with the same measuring stick despite the edicts of the
constitution. The poor service delivery is a foxy design to keep the African
people in their place of poverty and to grind them down to servitude. The
deteriorating public health facilities do the same. I will not mention the
education sector. When the Lonmin workers asked for an equal-isation of
salaries, namely, to have equal pay for miners in each category of labour as it
is in other parts of the world where the major multinational corporate has
operations, the strange breed of leadership said this was unheard of. Yet the
executives were allowed to make the same argument for their bourgeois
remunerations, and to live large. No one could beat the argument of the
workers at the negotiations, pure and simple.
There is victory for us.
Jaki
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Subject: RE: [PAYCO] THE INTRINSIC VALUE OF EACH CITIZEN IN SA
Date: Thu, 20 Sep 2012 05:05:32 +0000
Cde Seroke
Thank you for an insightful analysis of the contemporary politics in this
country and abroad. The malaise of ‘Ukukhonza abelungi’ is embedded in some
Africans.
Especially, those who were never indoctrinated with the Africanist or black
consciousness ideologies. After 1994, I had hoped that this malaise was on an
advance stage of healing. However, I am startled with its resurgence more
especially, as it comes from
those who claim to have liberated the country. As you have touched the issue
of Marikana, when events unfolded, I posited that they would never get
anywhere in as far as their wage demands were concerned. The announcement of a
wage settlement of 22 % plus
a R 2000 bonus for ending the strike was good tidings for workers. In essence,
this has demonstrated that the capitalist system is exploitative. Those who
have been extracting our mineral reverses for the past preceding centuries,
have demonstrated to us
that they still have our money, when shove comes to push. It is not a
question of affordability. The interest of this whole saga resides with some of
the covert ANC big men who are surreptitiously benefiting from these
arrangements. a story is told about
Ramaphosa who purchased a Buffalo cow for 20 million rands while his workers
can’t make ends meet.
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]]
On Behalf Of Jaki Seroke
Sent: Wednesday, September 19, 2012 10:03 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: [PAYCO] THE INTRINSIC VALUE OF EACH CITIZEN IN SA
M'afrika Mduduzi Sibeko
The republic of South Africa is often described in glorious terms in
international forums for a variety of reasons. The core issues that negatively
affect the lives of its
citizens are mostly ignored in the very same circles, and when a social
implosion occurs the analysts look askance at each other and make ridiculous
observations. Let's face it, the views and opinions of the majority are
marginalised at these forums, and
even the decision making process in government belongs to a coterie of
conflicted personalities. The majority of those who should benefit from an
efficient state are not taken seriously. Like subliminal racism, the unequal
treatment of citizens has become
a norm and it is accepted as natural. This should not go on forever.
The president who is leading a state delegation in Brussels is yesterday
reported to have conveyed a sincere message of condolences to the families of
bereaved victims of
the suicide car bomb in Kabul, Afghanistan, after a suicide bomber took them
to be foreigners who denigrate the Muslim faith in the light of popular Arab
protests against a propaganda documentary made in the US. This presidential
message could be well and
good. Look closely and you will notice that the eight victims are white South
African working for a private airline in Afghanistan. Contrast this with his
attitude back home. Last month mineworkers were mowed down like flies in
Marikana in a process that
had been brewing up for four months at least in the dispute on wage increment
between the workers and Lonmin management. In full view of the media, the
killers of the workers were the state police. These killers are equally
underpaid, ill-equipped and ill-trained
personnel, largely Black, and led by a Black woman national police
commissioner who encouraged the killers to do so more often in the future, and
that they should not be sorry for what they did.
I believe the difference between the two unfortunate incidents where loss of
life occurred is the
colonial mentality of the leadership that hold power of the state. Over a
period of more than two thousand years, African people have been subjected to
slavery and massive exploitation of the resources - they are treated as lesser
beings by the imperialists
and their local running dogs. I guess the process of resolving
settler-colonialism makes it even more complex, with citizens expressing
differing sets of needs and expectations from the state. The aggrieved group
(the Marikana mineworkers, for example) continues
to be treated like beasts of burden, they live in squalid conditions, get
slave wage, etc., and are killed at will by their own elected government.
Colonial mentality is a trained conditioning of the mind and body. In the
story, the archer in a circus was
aggrieved by the tyranny and dictatorial behavior of the leading man in the
performance. The archer planned to accidentally shoot him with his arrow
during performance. This never happened despite several genuine attempts. The
archer was steeped into the
habit of shooting the apple on top of the leading man's head. Just like
colonial mentality -
Ba khonza abelungu.
This puts into question the value of each citizen in South Africa. The state
perpetuates inequality - the government steals from the coffers of the state
and do so with impunity.
The services they offer to the rich and the poor are not the same, and this
is deliberate. The justice system favors the rich and famous. You have to be
well-off to can afford to pay for superior legal service in the courts where
justice is supposed to
be seen to be done. I believe the false justifications for Chapter Nine
organisations in the constitution is meant to be a sop to calm down the
exploited majority. The political parties in parliament are on a gravy train -
each one of the various leaders
is advancing his or her interest against the collective national interest.
Even the erstwhile revolutionaries are comfortable with fighting for a position
on the mountain top in their organisations. This established paradigm must
change. The Marikana mountain
top is the forum of the majority. Citizens of the state must be treated like
decent human beings - all of them.
You, Comrade Mduduzi, have often advised us to have a global view on the
running of the state. Ethics and good governing principles. International laws
of competition and
the globalisation of economies, human rights issues in the international
context, and the importance of an open policy and modernisation. Like
Mangaliso Sobukwe, who led a paradigm shift away from cap in hand deputations
to plead for change, I believe the
revolution will come like waves, one after the other, to cleanse society of
its wrongs. The revolution will come from below - from the heat of the struggle
conducted by the Azanian masses. We will win.
Jaki
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