Johannesburg - The crusade to resuscitate the Chemical Energy Paper Printing Wood and Allied Workers Union (Ceppwawu) led its leaders and members to the doorstep of a plush office block in Bryanston yesterday.
The union marched to the offices of its fund and investment managers, Letsema Consulting, which it claimed was the reason why the organisation was split down the middle as some of its leaders were “bought” to favour irrational decisions.
Accompanied by Cosatu president S’dumo Dlamini and SACP deputy general secretary Solly Mapaila, the group of about 150 protesters hurled accusations at Isaac Shongwe and his partner Derek Thomas.
In 2000, Ceppwawu leaders entrusted Shongwe with the union members’ money and employed him as a consultant to establish the union’s investment company. They said they weren’t aware that Shongwe would be entitled to 27.5 percent of the financial returns. The money has amounted to R1.2 billion.
The union demanded he and his partner Thomas resign from Ceppwawu Investment as director and chief executive respectively.
Shongwe is said to also serve as the sole trustee of the Ceppwawu Development Trust, through which dividends from the investment company were meant to be paid to members.
The payments should have been made in June when the investment matured, but because of the dispute over the amount of money due to Shongwe, the closest Ceppwawu’s 82 000 members have come to their R6bn payout is in media reports.
An elderly woman, who did not want to be named, said: “It is very painful; this money was supposed to educate my children and secure my retirement.” As she and others on the march sang Struggle songs, ranting that Shongwe, who is also a trustee of the Aspen Institute in Washington, was a thief and a “greedy monster”.
Dlamini said Shongwe “must understand there can’t be a fight about a settlement with him, which he manipulates to suit him. He is a greedy man. He is heartless. He has allowed the killing of a union for so many years because he is purely concerned about his stomach.”
Ceppwawu general secretary Simon Mofokeng said Shongwe had divided their organisation by sneaking brown envelopes filled with money to some union leaders.
He was referring to the union’s deputy general secretary and national treasurer, who are said to have accepted bribes in order to frustrate the repayment process.
They are also leading the group of members who wanted the Labour Department to place the union under administration – and that, Mofokeng said, was so that control of the money stayed with Shongwe.
Shongwe and his partners were in Durban yesterday on other business.
Company representative Luke McLachlan accepted the memorandum of demands.
THE STAR