The South African Civil Society Information Service
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
A nonprofit news agency promoting social justice. Seeking answers to the question:
How do we make democracy work for the poor?
Mohamed Motala -
In recent years, strikes in South Africa have become turbulent. Today the Farlam Commission is hearing evidence of the 2012 strike on the platinum belt that was characterised by extreme use of violence on all sides. Mining companies, Lonmin, AngloPlat and Implats, assisted by the South African police, displayed aggressive behaviour towards striking mineworkers, which resulted in an elaborate show of force culminating in the biggest post-apartheid massacre in the history of South Africa....
Prof. Patrick Bond of the Centre For Civil Society speaks to The Real News Network about the end of the platinum belt strike and its implications for the future of labour in South Africa. He argues that the economy is about to formally go into a recession and that rating agencies Standard & Poor's and Fitch’s recent downgrading of South Africa will likely lead to a great deal of posturing about the need to discipline labour and relax some of the gains that labour has won,...
Media for Justice's Sipho Singiswa was in Marikana two months ago at the height of the platinum belt strike. He talked to striking mineworkers and their families about the trials and tribulations of living in South Africa’s low wage economy. Mineworkers and their wives spoke with passion about their daily struggle for survival and dignity. President Jacob Zuma was particularly singled out for his polygamy and lavish lifestyle. The resolution of the platinum strike is an important...
Richard Pithouse -
The massacre on 16 August 2012, and the events that followed it, including the grinding strike that has just been concluded, have inscribed Marikana into our history. The name Marikana and the date 16 August have been carved into our history with the same brutality, blood and resolve that have shaped so many of the events that have brought us to where we are.
Around the world both the massacre and the long and bitter strike have often been decisive turning points in societies. From Algeria...
Gillian Schutte & Sipho Singiswa -
The stadium in Phokeng outside Rustenberg exploded in jubilation when the end of the longest strike in South African history was announced on June 23. Men and women waved their arms victoriously in the air and resounding ululations and cheering reverberated as a great burden of domestic hardship lifted. Workers had changed history. They had valiantly resisted the dogged state and corporate attempt to smash their strike despite the personal hardships that they had to endure to reach this...
Leonard Gentle -
Two issues that journalists file under “labour news” continue to make headlines – the one inspirational, the other ludicrous. They show two very different faces of the now tired refrain of “20 years of democracy”.
In the one corner is the on-going platinum workers’ strike in which 70,000 workers lead a struggle to bury the tradition of cheap migrant labour that has been the cornerstone of wealth accumulation in this country. On the other is the spectre...
