Hands off the people of BCM

Unions have a rich, proud history in East London. One of South Africa’s most famous union leaders, Clements Kadalie, who co-founded the mighty Industrial and Commercial Union (ICU) in 1918, which rose to become Africa’s largest with a membership of 100 000, chose East London to start the independent ICU in 1928.

Kadalie was a provincial organiser of the ANC and lived in the city with his family until he died in 1951.

Kadalie, and the generations of unionists who came after him, especially in the 70s, when the regime had all but quashed black resistance in the then-Border corridor, dedicated their lives to fight against low wages, gross work conditions and racist repression at work and at home. It was a rough, tough battle but workers of this metro will recall how the community backed their cause.

Youths, women, sports players, churches, taxi people, black society and progressive whites showed solidarity with workers’ struggles. Many still fondly remember the slogan: “We don’t eat Wilson Rowntrees! Support the boycott!” with the witty cartoon of the boy spitting out a sweet.

This support was no easy decision. Yet it was a struggle taken up with gusto and no small measure of courage by people. There were beatings, detentions, torture and lives were lost.

The regime’s mutant puppets, the Ciskei Republic’s police and soldiers, waded in with sjamboks and bullets but they were valiantly rebuffed when the people in the 80s moved on to boycott buses.

Historically, Buffalo City’s community has suffered for the rights of the city’s workers, which are also human rights.

And so we come to the present: something has definitely gone wrong.

What would Kadalie and Saawu’s Thozamile Botha say about:

●Taximen and their hired killers gunning each other down, showing scant regard for commuters in busy ranks and streets;

Municipal workers trashing streets, breaking and burning bins showing no care for the people who must still walk these toooften unhealthy pavements and streets;

Strikers accused of sabotaging municipal water supply and sending the city into a life-threatening water outage; and the most recent outrage:

Ambulance drivers and attendants refusing to fetch ill and hurt people while they have confidential talks with bosses for more pay. Striking workers are accused of intimidating private ambulances, according to the provincial health department. People in need are suffering and one child is known to have died.

This is a shameful reward for a history of popular solidarity.

How did this historic, vibrant workercommunity bond snap?

And what is to be done?

People do not want glib politicking, and empty-tin sloganeering from sectors of the union movement.

This is a rugged industrial town crying out for decent, hardworking people to receive the basic modicum of service.

It’s time for unionised labour to rebuild a relationship of mutual trust and to try and regain the respect of the masses.