Human Rights Commission defends right to know Dear Amandla! AMANDLA! READERS WILL BE PLEASED TO know that in a recent landmark decision the Human Rights Commission (HRC)found that owners of private space used commercially for public purposes have no right of...
trade
Reclaiming Our Unions: The Crisis in SAMWU and the Continuing Fight for Democracy from Below | Amandla! Correspondent
As this issue of Amandla! goes to press, we read disturbing accounts of South African Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU) shop stewards being prevented by private security personnel from entering the union's Johannesburg headquarters, and being physically attacked with...
Isolate Apartheid Israel now! Build a powerful mass movement in solidarity with Palestine!
The message from the estimated 150,000 marchers who took part in the 9th August Cape Town march in solidarity with Palestine was powerful, principled and unequivocal: South Africa must end its diplomatic relations with Israel. It is a betrayal of South Africa's own...
Putting the rights of cleaners at the centre of the struggle for transformation of universities: The case of UJ cleaners
The debate on transformation of universities tends to focus on changes in colour and gender, as well as access to these institutions. These are vitally important questions, because they seek to cure the ills of colonialism and apartheid in university education. On the...
Cosatu
Vavi is back. after nine months of suspension, a successful lawsuit set the way for Vavi's return to Cosatu. This confirms Numsa's contention that the original suspension of Vavi violated Cosatu's constitution, indicating that Cosatu president S'dumo Dlaminiand his...
A new Cosatu a new future?
The probable expulsion of Numsa from Cosatu marks the beginning of a profound re-organisation and possible renewal of the workers' movement. The most likely outcome will be the emergence of a new federation organised around Numsa, along with the eight other unions...
Numsa and the crisis in the Cosatu: What now?
by Benjamin Fogel During the 1980s the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) was the figurehead of the so-called 'workerist' tendency within the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) and has always been on the left in Cosatu. Although Numsa...
Responses
Sakhela Buhlungu: It has taken more than 20 years for the dominant current of South Africa's labour movement to begin to emerge from stasis resulting from its embeddedness within the ruling political block led by the African National Congress. The massacre of...
Taking Politics beyond the Factory Seriously
by Richard Pithouse Numsa's's resolve to break with both the ANC and the authority that the SACP has tried to exert over the union movement carries the potential for a real political opening. The union's commitment to work with other struggles, including community...

