As Cosatu will be embarking on a national strike on 27 September to protest against state capture and corruption, City of Johannesburg Mayor Herman Mashaba has a very short message for the trade union, ‘Go protest at the headquarters of corruption, Saxonwold’.
National spokesperson of Cosatu Sizwe Pamla said their first stop will actually be at the City’s headquaters, the Metro Centre in Braamfontein. According to Pamla, they will drop a memorandum of demands to the Mayor’s office where, among other things, they will be demanding that free basic water is given back to the working class. He said they also want to address the issue of unfair suspensions on workers by the City and what he claimed is employment discrimination within the City.
Read: Non-indigent households will no longer receive free water according to Mayor Herman Mashaba
In a statement, Mashaba said Cosatu and its affiliates should be applauding the City not marching against it, as it has made strides in fighting things that Cosatu claim to be against, like labour broking. The mayor mentioned that bringing the Jozi@Work programme to an end was one such bold and decisive step his administration took.
“The Jozi@Work programme was a wolf in sheep’s clothing, benefitting only the middlemen who were awarded multimillion-rand contracts to run projects.
For a trade union which is against labour brokers, it is ironic that Cosatu would support the Jozi@Work programme, which is essentially run by brokers,” reads Mashaba’s statement.
The mayor also highlighted how his administration is fighting daily to deal with corruption within the City.
Read: Cosatu leader guilty of hate speech
On the issue of free basic water, Mashaba said it was part of the City’s commitment to care for the poorest residents. “We have committed to providing free basic water to residents on the City’s indigent list. Depending on household income, our poorest residents will receive up to a maximum of 15 kilolitres of free water per household, per month in line with the City’s Expanded Social Package Policy,” Mashaba said in a statement, adding that it was bizarre that Cosatu seeks to protect the interest of society’s elite.
“If Cosatu and its affiliates are determined to fight corruption, they must first take this fight to where corruption is planned, at Saxonwold,” Mashaba said in a statement.
