Angry unions lash out at Vavi

Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. Photo: BHEKI RADEBE

Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi. Photo: BHEKI RADEBE

Published Mar 30, 2015

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Johannesburg - Cosatu general secretary Zwelinzima Vavi is facing mounting backlash from unions affiliated to the federation.

This follows his statements on Sunday that he would disengage from all union activities and pursue workers’ struggles on the streets. He also laid bare the dire financial state that the federation was in.

On Monday, the SA Democratic Teachers Union said that Vavi was to blame for the financial mess of Cosatu, incorrectly stating that his wife is the co-director of a company which supplies Cosatu with IT and telecommunication services.

“VMS, a company co-directed by his wife is the beneficiary milking the federation through the biometrics and cameras it installed at Cosatu House. This unnecessary expense is costing the federation more than half a million rand on a monthly basis,” said Sadtu general secretary Mugwena Maluleke in a statement.

Vavi’s wife, Noluthando, was in partnership with Craig Greene, who owns VMS Technologies, for a short while in an oil company that never got off the ground. Vavi has reiterated that his wife has never benefited from the VMS contracts with Cosatu.

Sadtu said it was also angry that Vavi had announced his decision at a press conference.

“We find it hard to accept that he convened the ‘public show’ in our offices only to speak ill against the federation. He has milked dry his charm offensive to profile himself as a victim of a purge seeking pity not only from Federation members but the entire country,” said Maluleke.

The National Union of Mineworkers has also registered its displeasure with Vavi.

In statement titled: “Defiance requires moral virtue, not compromised characters to succeed”, the union said Vavi was “a coward running away from taking responsibility for his acts”.

It referenced his affair with a junior staffer as proof.

“If he is a champion of the working class as he professes he would have protected and defended the young woman he sexually molested in the office. Worse was his reference to that young staff member as ‘nopatazana’ which according to isiXhosa speakers means a bitchy conduct by a lady,” the union said.

Vavi’s future is being discussed by a special sitting of Cosatu’s central executive committee on Monday and Tuesday.

Labour Bureau

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