Johannesburg - Cosatu’s political crisis is far from over. The Cosatu central executive committee was adjourned on Thursday night without concluding many of the most divisive issues on its agenda.
Although there was a determined push on Thursday by the majority of the CEC’s members to expel Cosatu’s biggest union, Numsa, the federation’s leaders instead opted for the adjournment for fear of a Numsa court challenge in the event of their expulsion or suspension.
Cosatu’s national office bearers have put a number of items on the agenda for the November 7 meeting. They include Numsa making representations on why it should not be expelled; and an update on disciplinary processes, including those against Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi.
Insiders told Independent Media that Cosatu president S’dumo Dlamini would brief the November meeting on a special national congress, which a third of the federation’s affiliates have called for, hoping that it will resolve the infighting. Cosatu’s constitution enjoins its president to call a special congress if at least one third of affiliates in good standing request it in writing.
This criterion was met by August last year, but the group of anti-Numsa’s unions have so far stalled the meeting.
Further complicating Cosatu’s timetable, is the looming meeting of the central committee (CC), also set down for next month.
The CC is akin to a mid-term congress and is meant to evaluate progress towards achieving the federation’s ambitious 2015 programme. Now the new executive meeting will have the difficult task of deciding whether the CC meeting should go ahead. A postponement of the CC, now clearly on the cards, will have a domino effect on the ordinary national congress, which should be held next September.
At the centre of the seemingly intractable impasse in the federation is Numsa, which last weekend launched a series of alliances with civil society organisations across the country, a process leading to the formation of a workers’ party to challenge Cosatu’s ally, the ANC.
Numsa faces expulsion from Cosatu for this and other alleged breaches of the constitution and “founding principles”, such as “poaching” members from sister unions. The push for its expulsion at the three-day CEC meeting this week was led by the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union and the SA Transport and Allied Workers’ Union.
Numsa warned Cosatu before the gathering that it would challenge any sanction in court, because the matter was not on the agenda.
The CEC was meant to discuss a report from the ANC which has been attempting to mediate a peace deal in Cosatu as well as a secretariat report for next month’s CC.
But in the executive, Numsa lost the fight to keep expulsion off the agenda, with 34 members voting for it to be added and 23 against.
The Star