SWAZILAND: Labour movement says it's far from dead

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations]

MBABANE, 6 May 2005 (IRIN) - The Swaziland labour movement is suffering from declining membership as manufacturing and agricultural industries shed jobs, and faces a public image problem in the wake of media reports of internal divisions and corruption. But union officials told IRIN the clout of collective labour to effect political and social change is not dead.

"The issue of retrenchments has been hard hitting. The last big influx of jobs came with the textile industries. They are now laying off workers, and there are no new meaningful jobs being created in Swaziland," said Vincent Ncongwane, secretary general of the Swaziland Federation of Labour (SFL).

Although in the past year SFL's membership has declined by about a third to 10,000 members, the federation has not attracted the controversy of the larger, 80,000-strong Swaziland Federation of Trade Unions (SFTU), or its firebrand secretary general Jan Sithole, who for a decade has led Swaziland's pro-democracy movement.

SFTU president Africa Magongo, currently on study leave in England, would not confirm or deny that he has resigned his position on the federation executive, but this week, in an article published in both daily newspapers, he blasted his labour federation for mismanagement and a cult of personality built around Sithole.

In a worker's day speech to SFTU members on Monday, Musa Hlope, former secretary general of the Federation of Swaziland Employers, criticised them for turning Sithole into a "god" who must be slavishly followed and never criticised.

In a press statement issued on Friday, Sithole said as far as he was concerned, Magongo was no longer SFTU president. Sithole added that it was the government's new draft constitution, which bans opposition parties and entrenches royal rule, that has made a "god" of King Mswati.

Former vice secretary general for the SFTU, Jabulani Nxumalo, has also weighed into the debate over the leadership of the federation. He told the press on Friday he had received death threats when he criticised Sithole at a general meeting.

"I was referred to as a traitor. They wanted me to meet my death through the 'necklace-tyre style' imported from South Africa, where a car tyre is burnt around one's neck," said Nxumalo, now an Mbabane city councillor.

Divisions in the labour movement have emerged at a time when textile industries have shed a third of their 15,000 workforce this past year, as factory orders have dried up. Swazi exports are twice as expensive as two years ago due to the rise in the value of the South African rand, to which the Swazi currency, the lilangeni, is tied.

Swazi sugar, the country's top agricultural export, is also more expensive for overseas buyers, while the world price for sugar has dropped by a third. The major sugar plantations, which have long been a stronghold of the SFTU, are also losing jobs.

The political clout of the labour movement also appears to have been dented. Only a few members and banned political parties joined a nationwide stay-away called by the SFTU in January to protest the draft constitution, while public support seemed negligible.

Government spokesman Percy Simelane said workers' insecurity over their jobs took precedent over a dimly understood political agenda.

"If you know there are four or five people who are in place to take your job, you don't down tools over an ill-conceived political action," Simelane told IRIN.

SFL chief Ncongwane also blames worker insecurity about their jobs for a decline in overall union membership against the backdrop of a 40 percent unemployment rate.

"There is a general fear about joining unions. Workers think there is a relationship between loss of jobs and union membership," said Ncongwane.

The SFTU was also facing a rebellion among its affiliated unions, who have raised charges of corruption among federation executives and are either withholding or unable to pay their union dues.

Federation officials told IRIN off the record that only a general membership meeting could clear the air, and hopefully put rumours to rest and settle divisive rivalries. But there are no immediate plans to call a general meeting, which promises to be a tempestuous assembly, officials said.

[ENDS]