GARDEN ROUTE NEWS - The district held its breath when riots broke out in Mossel Bay on Tuesday, a day before the national strike planned by the two largest South African trade union federations, Cosatu (Congress of South African Trade Unions) and Saftu (South African Federation of Trade Unions).
D-day was yesterday, 24 August, when the union heavyweights promised to bring the country to a standstill, calling on all non-essential workers to stay away from work.
Yesterday's strike was not as well supported as the unions had hoped and definitely did not shut down the country.
At the time of going to press a few thousand marchers had gathered at the civic centre and in Pretoria thousands of strikers descended on the Union buildings.
Protest action was expected in all provinces. By lunchtime yesterday, no incidents were reported in George and Oudtshoorn.
However, in Bitou another type of tension was rearing its head - xenophobia. In his address to council late yesterday morning, District Mayor Memory Booysen said tension in one area tends to affect other towns as well, triggering unintended consequences.
He said he has seen newsletters in Bitou, informing foreigners that they have to leave townships before the end of the month. "I am a very worried mayor," said Booysen.
These acts of xenophobia were strongly condemned by PBI leader Virgill Gericke in his reply to the mayoral address.
Booysen said yesterday that the situation is very tense. He thanked the teams at the joint operation centres for being there and responding to incidents. Booysen asked all leaders to take a stand against any acts of xenophobia.
"Regardless of the merits of what makes people angry, there are agents employed by the state to deal with any matter. We cannot condone communities taking the law in their own hands. We should not allow a wrong view of SA to be projected to the rest of the world."
District Mayor Memory Booysen Photo: Michelle Pienaar
The nationwide strike
Dr Willie Cilliers, chair-person of the George Business Chamber, said a nationwide strike is extremely disruptive and very bad for the economy. "We already have a declining economy and really cannot afford such a strike."
The strike is legally protected, but only for non-essential workers. Eskom employees have been warned that they are considered essential workers.
Economist Roelof Botha told Netwerk24 on Tuesday that the planned strike is econo-mic insanity and if it leads to a 10% decline in productivity, the country could suffer an economic loss of R1,7-billion. He said this is enough to pay a Covid allowance to 400 000 jobless people for an entire year.
Cosatu maintains the reason for the strike is to place pressure on government and the private sector to rectify socio-economic challenges. It is a call for government to intervene in the cost-of-living crisis through a thorough examination of the Public Investment Cooperation (PIC) and Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF).
Cosatu's deputy parliamentary coordinator, Matthew Parks, said on eNCA on Monday 22 August that there are significant gaps in the pay-out of funding that was meant to benefit workers during the pandemic. He said over the two-year course of Covid-19, an amount of R64-billion was released from the UIF to benefit 5,5 million workers in the private sector, but that there were many problems with pay-outs, including fraud and corruption where employers deducted funds from workers, allegedly to pay the UIF, but didn't do so.
He said many workers received no benefits, such as domestic workers who work for more than one employer, as well as artists and musicians who are self-employed and work one night a week.
Cosatu is looking for "pro worker type of interventions" and will have robust discussions at its congress in September.
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