Tens of thousands of protestors are expected to hit the streets of Pretoria and Cape Town tomorrow to march against corruption.
Addressing a press conference in Gauteng yesterday, Numsa general-secretary Irvin Jim anticipated the march would be a “huge success”.
This is despite the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac) granting workers the right to take part in a protected mass action only in 14 days time, not tomorrow.
Jim said it meant workers would have to use their own discretion and rely on their employers’ sympathy to be able to take part in the mass action.
Jim described Nedlac’s decision to only allow workers to be part of a protected strike action in two weeks’ time as “sabotage”.
More than 200 civic organisations, unions and more than 700 individual artists have endorsed Unite Against Corruption.
Well-known personalities such as Zakes Mda, Mark Gevisser, Gcina Mhlophe and Pieter-Dirk Uys have declared their full support for the mass action.
Other organisations on board include Transparency International, Oxfam, Amnesty International, the National Union of Mineworkers of South Africa (Numsa) and its allies in Cosatu, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, the South African Football Players Union (Safpu), as well as civic organisations such as Corruption Watch, the Treatment Action Campaign and Equal Education.
The Cape Town leg of the march will start at Keizersgracht Street near District Six to parliament, while the Pretoria march will start at Burgers Park to the Union buildings, both from 11am.
Addressing workers as a build up to tomorrow’s march, another organisor of the event, former Cosatu general-secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said: “We shall be protesting at the squandering of the nation’s wealth through corruption, fraud, tax evasion and money laundering.”
Vavi said critics of the protest action say corruption is only a middle-class concern.
“It is the workers more than any other class in society that has a primary responsibility to stop this slide into the abyss. Only we can confront a corrupt, capitalist system and use its power to fight for socialist alternatives,” said Vavi.
He also lashed at Nedlac’s Section 77 Committee, which he said “sabotaged a move to protect workers who go on strike”.
“But we shall not retreat, comrades. Unless we take action now, we shall be sinking towards a kleptocractic and predatory capitalist system where there will be no accountability and where corruption will be the norm,” said Vavi.
The South African Football Players Union’s general secretary Thulaganyo Gaoshubelwe said their union fully backs tomorrow’s anti-corruption march “as a matter of principle”.
“We do so mainly because corruption affects all sectors of the economy as well as erodes the gains made post the apartheid era. Our members and future generations of footballers in this country are not immune to this barbaric practice,” said Gaoshubelwe.
High hopes for anti-corruption march
Addressing a press conference in Gauteng yesterday, Numsa general-secretary Irvin Jim anticipated the march would be a “huge success”.
This is despite the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac) granting workers the right to take part in a protected mass action only in 14 days time, not tomorrow.
Jim said it meant workers would have to use their own discretion and rely on their employers’ sympathy to be able to take part in the mass action.
Jim described Nedlac’s decision to only allow workers to be part of a protected strike action in two weeks’ time as “sabotage”.
More than 200 civic organisations, unions and more than 700 individual artists have endorsed Unite Against Corruption.
Well-known personalities such as Zakes Mda, Mark Gevisser, Gcina Mhlophe and Pieter-Dirk Uys have declared their full support for the mass action.
Other organisations on board include Transparency International, Oxfam, Amnesty International, the National Union of Mineworkers of South Africa (Numsa) and its allies in Cosatu, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union, the South African Football Players Union (Safpu), as well as civic organisations such as Corruption Watch, the Treatment Action Campaign and Equal Education.
The Cape Town leg of the march will start at Keizersgracht Street near District Six to parliament, while the Pretoria march will start at Burgers Park to the Union buildings, both from 11am.
Addressing workers as a build up to tomorrow’s march, another organisor of the event, former Cosatu general-secretary Zwelinzima Vavi said: “We shall be protesting at the squandering of the nation’s wealth through corruption, fraud, tax evasion and money laundering.”
Vavi said critics of the protest action say corruption is only a middle-class concern.
“It is the workers more than any other class in society that has a primary responsibility to stop this slide into the abyss. Only we can confront a corrupt, capitalist system and use its power to fight for socialist alternatives,” said Vavi.
He also lashed at Nedlac’s Section 77 Committee, which he said “sabotaged a move to protect workers who go on strike”.
“But we shall not retreat, comrades. Unless we take action now, we shall be sinking towards a kleptocractic and predatory capitalist system where there will be no accountability and where corruption will be the norm,” said Vavi.
The South African Football Players Union’s general secretary Thulaganyo Gaoshubelwe said their union fully backs tomorrow’s anti-corruption march “as a matter of principle”.
“We do so mainly because corruption affects all sectors of the economy as well as erodes the gains made post the apartheid era. Our members and future generations of footballers in this country are not immune to this barbaric practice,” said Gaoshubelwe.
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