COSATU Business As Usual

The Communist University convenes this evening at 17h00 at the Women’s Jail, 1 Kotze Street, Constitution Hill to discuss Christopher Caudwell’s “Pacifism and Violence”. There is no scheduled session for next week, and we will have to decide what to use for the following week (September 29). The topic could be the COSATU 9th Congress, which starts on Monday september 18th and finishes on the 21st. A major document was released yesterday. It is the “State of COSATU” assessment by NALEDI. The statement made to the Press Conference is a concise summary of the document (linked below). The full document can be downloaded from the same Internet page. The class struggles of COSATU affiliates and their members are not suspended for the COSATU Congress. COSATU affiliate SACCAWU is in dispute with Shoprite Checkers. There was a big demonstration in Johannesburg yesterday, addressed by COSATU GS Zwelinzima Vavi. He called for a boycott of the stores belonging to this group. See the linked article below. Cde Vavi also addressed the ETDP SETA with a solid, hard-hitting and progressive statement of the nature and the priorities of worker education, linked below. COSATU has also raised its voice, once again, to condemn the treatment of Zimbabwean workers in struggle by the state in that country. Large numbers of workers were affected in Wednesday’s ZCTU-led protests, but in particular, senior leaders who had been expected at COSATU’s Congress next week were tortured in a shocking way. Details are in the COSATU Press Release linked below. SADTU is the militant teacher’s union affiliated to COSATU. Like COSATU itself it has been assaulted with rumours and innuendo. SADTU sets the record straight in the statement linked below. Some of the dubious anonymous-sourced material relating to COSATU can be found in Moshoeshoe Monare’s report from yesterday’s Star newspaper of yesterday, linked below. This is one example of a lot more such stuff in several of the bourgeois newspapers and from the approved "analysts" on television and radio. The CU has ignored most of it, but it does not do to pretend it is not there. In any case the Congress will purge the nonsense. Click on these links: Press Statement on the State of COSATU, NALEDI plus download (2021 words) Boycott Shoprite Checkers, says COSATU, Shoba, Mail and Guardian (543 words) COSATU GS Zwelinzima Vavi, Input to ETDP SETA 14 Sept 2006 (1595 words) COSATU condemns ZCTU arrests and assaults, 14 September 2006 (388 words) SADTU NWC rejects vote rigging allegations, 14 September 2006 (588 words) Moshoeshoe Monare's version of COSATU, The Star (453 words)