Johannesburg - Cosatu president Zingiswa Losi has called on tripartite alliance leaders to emulate its stalwarts and liberation heroes if the commemorative events they organise in their names are to have any meaning at all.
Losi was speaking on Thursday in Soweto during the unveiling of a mural of ANC and SACP veteran and former Robben Islander Harry Gwala, organised by his foundation.
This month will mark a centenary since Gwala’s birth. The late leader was known to be an outspoken critic of corruption and deviant behaviour, which often placed him at odds with some members he led, including earning temporary suspension from the SACP.
Losi said Gwala and other leaders who dedicated their lives to the Struggle for liberation deserved more than commemorations - rather, active emulation in terms of how current leaders behave and align themselves with what they stand for.
“Ours must be to say that we are not going to be praise singers of leaders but that we are going to be brave enough to criticise, and say if Bab’uGwala was here, this is what he would have stood for. If we are going to have the kind of a country that he and his peers fought for, we need to do as they would have done if they were here, as they did for us to attain our freedom,” Losi said.
She said liberation stalwarts would be irritated with the current leaders if they proclaimed their names without practically emulating them in terms of how they conducted themselves.
“I guess any ancestor gets irritated if you keep on calling their name but do the opposite. It is then important that when we talk about our leaders and hold memorial lectures, we must be saying ‘we recognise you and what you stood for and we are here to say we shall follow on your footsteps’,” she said.
Losi said growing unemployment, poverty and inequality were among issues that Gwala would have taken issue with under the democratic dispensation, if he were alive.
“Up to this day, we are battling to ensure that our people are able to have the basic necessities and it is what I think Bab’uGwala would have been vocal about and irritated with because it is not the Struggle he pursued,” Losi said.