Thousands in Cosatu march

DEPUTY National Assembly Speaker Lechesa Tsenoli’s presence loomed large during yesterday’s nationwide marches against state capture, as the senior alliance leader vowed that he could no longer remain silent on the matter.

Parliament is investigating allegations of state capture against the controversial Gupta family, who have been accused of using their friendship with President Jacob Zuma to loot the state coffers.

Thousands of workers aligned to Cosatu yesterday took the fight against state capture to the streets, where they also showed they wanted Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa to replace Zuma.

The protest also became a platform to once again intensify calls made by Cosatu and the SACP for Zuma to step down as president.

Tsenoli, who marched in Nelspruit, Mpumalanga, said his participation would not affect the investigations of Parliament into state capture.

“I am not part of those committees who investigate state capture and I do not participate in their investigations,” he said.

Tsenoli, a central committee member of the SACP, said his participation in the march was to deal with the inappropriateness of state capture.

“I am a member of the SACP and the ANC and cannot remain silent on these matters,” he said.

SACP boss Blade Nzimande urged all public sector unions to set aside their differences and focus on stopping “parasites” from stealing their pension funds.

Nzimande, who is also the minister of higher education, made the call to labour unions despite Finance Minister Malusi Gigaba’s assurances that government employees’ pension funds were safe

He said the call for the ANC to “self correct” was just like a mirage, saying “it would never happen”.

Despite some anticipating looting and mayhem in Cape Town’s CBD, the march went off without incident yesterday.

Pavements along the route to the Cape Town station from Keizersgracht to the Western Cape legislature and finally Parliament were void of informal traders until after the march had ended.

And though commuters and passengers were warned to expect disruptions to public transport services, all services were operational throughout the day.

Executive director for safety and security Richard Bosman said stall owners along the route were served notices a day before to not trade on the day.

A memorandum intended for Premier Helen Zille was however, pushed under the door of the legislature as the premier was not there to accept the memorandum herself, which Cosatu had demanded..

Cosatu’s Western Cape leader, Tony Ehrenreich, said they asked Zille to personally accept the memorandum.

“We did not want to come here, because when we said there is a crisis in this province… that there is state capture in this province… she did not come out or send anybody out to accept the memorandum.

“We said clearly we would not be handing over the memorandum to anybody but to the madam herself,” he said.

Former SACP deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin also called for action against state capture, saying billions of rand were stolen every year.

Cronin, who is also the deputy minister of Public Works, told an estimated 2 500 Cosatu members outside Parliament that the rot in the government must come to an end.

Cronin said fighting state capture was important for the country.

“Here in government, because I am part of government, we think R27 billion is taken out of the country every year and that represents 76 000 jobs,” he said of state capture.

“We think the private sector takes R170bn out of the country every year.”

But Cronin said some battles had been won in the war on state capture after the banks closed the Guptas’ accounts.

The Bank of Baroda will be the last bank to close its accounts with the Guptas at the end of the month.