Inqaba ya basebenzi Number 2 April 1981 - DISA

playing on the anxieties of the white
workers, claiming to have the answer
to the defence of white privilege and
jobs.
Because of their position, of
entrenched privileges, its edges as yet
barely nibbled at, the bulk of the
white workers are pre-disposed to
follow this rotten verkrampte
leadership. with its racist
rallying-cry. But in the election they
will prefer to follow it Inside the
Nationalist Party, rather than on its
ultra-right fringes.
In the Nationalist Party, there has
been an unprecedented number of
nomination contests between
'verligtes' and verkramptes, with the
verkramptes on the whole winning.
A setback for Botha's leadership,
this and the state's harassment of the
ultra-right parties will probably
mean that onlv the most frustrated
and resentful reactionaries will stay
with the HNP or CNP,
Future
IS IN TATTERS
•in response to these gains in the
Eastern Cape, the struggle of motor
workers in Pretoria to organise ana
win higher wages;
•wage increases of 60% at Kellogs,
plus recognition of the union;
•the recognition of SAAWU at
Chloride in East London;
•that the strike at Post raised the
question; who controls the press?
MWASA President Zwelakhe Sisulu
(now banned) said the choice facing
revolutionary journalists was whether
to be "collaborative propagandists
or revolutionary propagandists".
Mosi important of all, trade union
membership has nearly tripled,
rising from 3% to some 7% of the
African industrial workforce. Whole
towns are becoming strongholds of
the trade union movement. Workers
are streaming to the trade unions
asking to be organised.
Here Is revealed the explosive
potential of the trade union movement
in South Africa! If a rise in the
percentage organised to just 7% has
such devastating effects on the ruling
class, then the mass of the working
class organised around a clear
programme will represent an unstop­
But the election victory for the
Nationalist Party will not even buy
Botha and the ruling class much
time. The impending downturn in
the economy, and the bosses'
relentless search for profits, will lay
the basis for further huge struggles
and upheavals. The mass movement
of the black oppressed, full of
pable force!
This is what the ruling class fears.
The apartheid regime, and the
capitalist class that it represents,
cannot tolerate a movement of the
united working class. One of the
main reasons for the banning of
'Post' and controls on the press has
been (he regime's fear of strike
reports which, it claims, are creating
a "revolutionary climate" in South
Africa.
Those trade union officials who
led their unions into the trap of
registering under the Wiehahn
strategy should now openly acknowledge
that this was wrong. Nor is
there the way forward through
relying on the so-called "liberal"
elements of big business; what can
be won from them must be used, but
without illusions.
At this time, the central task is to
organise the unorganised workers.
As yet, only about 200,000 African
workers are organised, and those are
largely the non-migrant section.
Millions of workers still wait to come
11
confidence, is not prepared to
tolerate threats to its very survival.
Against the attacks of the bosses on
the living standards of the whole
working class, the mass movement
will respond with vigour.
The ruling class will muster all its
forces to crush these struggles, but.
so long as the black workers and
youth grow together and organise on
the basis of greater clarity of aims,
the mass movement will remain
undefeated. The sword of repression
will only stimulate with more
urgency the struggle for the
democratic means through which
living standards can be defended and
advanced.
Thus, despite the clamouring it
into the unions, including ihe most
decisive section of all, the migrant
mineworkers from all the countries
of Southern Africa. The organisation
of the unemployed, together with the
employed, must be taken forward.
By taking up and combining all
ihe pressing demands that workers
are fighting for in factories throughout
ihe country, the trade union
movement can become a movement
of millions. A central plank in this
programme is the demand for a
national minimum wage of R90 a
week, with further increases linked
to Inflation.
Organised into the trade unions in
its millions on the basis of a fighting
programme, the working class will
become a giant power. Building Ihis
trade union power, and at the same
time struggling to build the ANC as
its own mass political movement on a
socialist programme, the working
class will gain the means to smash
apartheid and sweep capitalist
exploitation from the face of South
Africa.
For a trade union movement uniting all workers!
For a mass ANC with a socialist programme!