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After rigorously campaigning for President Cyril Ramaphosa to be ANC president, Cosatu wanted its pound of flesh from him when he came to address the union’s central executive committee (CEC) this week.
The federation was already seeing red three months into Ramaphosa’s tenure, particularly after his failure to take it into his confidence about crucial policy decisions, including the increase of the VAT rate prior to the tabling of the budget.
Cosatu’s intensifying fight against privatisation was among the issues Ramaphosa was confronted with this week when he was invited to the first day of the three-day CEC meeting.
City Press understands that in his defence, Ramaphosa explained that any leaks before the budget could have compromised the economy.
According to insiders, Ramaphosa told Cosatu leaders that informing them before the actual announcement of the 1% increase to VAT made by then Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba during his budget speech in February was going to create panic.
He allegedly said the budget was always highly anticipated by the markets, and the economy was not going to stomach it had they risked a leak by taking them into his confidence.
The question was who was responsible for “government’s anti-worker budget”, which Cosatu said handed the tab of corruption, maladministration and policy failures to the working class through a VAT increase.
“He was asked whether Treasury is part of government or if Treasury is the government, or is independent of government, seeing that the policies it drives are anti-workers,” said one Cosatu leader.
Another said Ramaphosa was told that Treasury doesn’t account to Cabinet, but rather informs it.
While there were some who heaped praise for the various appointments that Ramaphosa made, other Cosatu leaders took Ramaphosa on about rewarding people in the forefront of workers’ onslaught.
Among those names was the Eskom board chairperson Jabu Mabuza, who in his previous position at Telkom retrenched 10 000 workers as part of his turnaround strategy.
Ramaphosa was told that his appointments of Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan, Finance Minister Nhlanhla Nene and MTN independent nonexecutive director Mcebisi Jonas – all of whom he appointed after taking over from former president Jacob Zuma – was not done in the interest of the working class.
“We said you [Ramaphosa] know that Nhlanhla Nene is not representing ANC government. You told us he was recommended by the World Bank to chair Eskom before you went to Davos [for the World Economic Forum], now you want to pretend he represents the ANC.”
Cosatu expressed its dissatisfaction publicly on Thursday, with its officials bemoaning the “recycling of ministers and board members at state-owned enterprises”.
“We want the president to honour his promise of cutting down his bloated Cabinet and stop deploying the very same ministers who have implemented the failed policies of the past 24 years.”
Coming out of that meeting, Cosatu expressed its unhappiness with “the heightened offensive against the working class, which expresses itself in government policies that include cuts in real wages, increase in taxes, retrenchments, cuts in pensions and retirement benefits, and an increase in unemployment rates”.
Cosatu’s list of concerns to Ramaphosa was deferred to the long-awaited alliance political council. That meeting was scheduled to sit tomorrow, but has been postponed owing to the unavailability of some officials.
A strong sentiment within Cosatu was that Ramaphosa was in fact taking the federation for granted and that workers were on their own. This was further fuelled by the fact he invited everyone else to the land summit, including academics, but snubbed Cosatu, a key ally representing workers, from the discussions that took place last weekend.
Ramaphosa was quizzed about how he allowed Energy Minister Jeff Radebe to sign independent power producer (IPP) agreements two days after appointing him to Cabinet. Cosatu was unhappy that Ramaphosa sat at the National Economic Development and Labour Council and was aware of Cosatu’s strong opposition to it. The federation believed that the creation of 58 000 jobs as promised by the IPPs was a fallacy and that it would lead to more than 40 000 job losses in coal mines and other secondary industries. The president committed to bringing Radebe to the alliance political council, where he would table a report.
Under Zuma, the tripartite alliance as a whole had become accustomed to apologies, and there were concerns that there could be more apologies to come early into Ramaphosa’s governance.
Cosatu leaders came short of explicitly stating to Ramaphosa that their support in next year’s election was not guaranteed.
Ramaphosa was set to spend less than an hour at the meeting, but so “robust” was it that he was kept for three hours.
