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Unions plan for Zim collapse
16/07/2007 22:14 - (SA)
Johannesburg - Southern African labour federations are preparing for the collapse of the Zimbabwean economy, it emerged on Monday.
"We are worried that if (mediation) fails, the Zimbabwe economy will collapse completely, with dire consequences for the poor of that country and the region as a whole," the Congress of SA Trade Unions (Cosatu) and the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) said in a joint statement.
Cosatu would be discussing a package of people-based, humanitarian interventions with its alliance and civil society partners "in preparation for this reality", said Cosatu secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi.
Cosatu held four hours of talks with a ZCTU delegation in Johannesburg on Monday. At present 5 000 Zimbabweans were arrested trying to cross the border into South Africa every week, said Vavi.
Complete collapse
"What do we do if that economy eventually collapses altogether?" he asked.
"No-one is going to stop the flow of Zimbabweans into South Africa and other countries. They will walk and walk in view, in the open, to other homes in order to survive," he said.
Cosatu had already sent tons of sanitary pads to Zimbabwe to help the country's women. Now it was looking at sending food and blankets.
It was time South Africans realised that their challenges of poverty and unemployment were a "Sunday picnic" compared with the struggle over the border, said Vavi.
A solution to the crisis in Zimbabwe had to be found "yesterday", said ZCTU secretary-general Wellington Shibebe. "Today is too late and tomorrow will be disaster."
The ZCTU had 330 000 paid-up members from the country's workforce of 998 000, he said. The unemployment rate in the country was currently at 80%.
Cosatu and the ZCTU have demanded talks between the Zimbabwean government, labour and business to resolve the crisis of empty shelves, food shortages and hunger.
Mugabe ignores protocol
However, Shibebe said, a pricing stabilisation protocol signed by business, labour and the government on June 1 was ignored by President Robert Mugabe, who ordered the wholesale slashing of prices just three weeks later.
While Mugabe had held off on salary cuts, it was just a matter of time until these too were imposed.
Zimbabwe might have got its freedom in 1980, but it "forgot to bring democracy and all the necessary freedoms" to its people, he said.
If Zimbabweans had one request of President Thabo Mbeki, it was that he ensure they have free and fair elections, said ZCTU deputy president Lucia Madibenga.
In their statement, Cosatu and the ZCTU said: "We want a democratic process, involving civil society, to draw up a new, progressive constitution and free and fair elections in line with SADC protocols."
However, Vavi said Cosatu was "very worried" that mediation in Zimbabwe would go the same way as South Africa's observation of the previous elections - declaring free and fair what the rest of the world condemned as riddled with irregularities.
It was also worried at Mugabe and his ZANU-PF political party's apparent "frustration" of the SADC process and their lack of co-operation.
They had failed to arrive at talks on more than one occasion, wasting valuable time in the search for a solution to the crisis, Vavi said.
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