Cosatu to participate in SACP's Conference of the Left

Cosatu said its participation in this week’s South African Communist Party (SACP)-convened Conference of the Left does not mean it supports any political party in their bid to win elections.

The trade union's president Zingiswa Losi, who will be one of the speakers at the event in Boksburg on Friday, said the federation would participate in the event but would retain its neutrality.

The conference has once again highlighted deep-seated differences between the SACP and the ANC, which made it clear through its Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula, that it would not attend. 

The conference, whose theme is “Building a Left Movement for Working-Class & Popular Power”, will be attended by various leftist political parties and unions. 

The ANC’s rejection of the SACP’s invitation to the conference has worsened the relationship between the two parties, which are Tripartite Alliance partners along with Cosatu.

The two parties squared up after the SACP decided it would contest the upcoming local government elections on its own, competing against the ANC. 

The SACP conference will feature political parties such as the EFF, Socialist Party of Azania, Pan Africanist Congress of Azania (PAC), Azanian People's Organisation (AZAPO), and the uMkhonto weSizwe Party (MKP).

National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) General Secretary Irvin Jim, whose union was expelled from Cosatu in 2014, is also listed as speaker. 

Losi said Cosatu is participating in the conference in a politically charged environment building up to the local government elections where “everyone wants to contest the space”.

“Cosatu is not going there to help anyone contest any political space, but we are first going to hear what the input is, and we are going to state how we view domestic and global issues and how all what is happening affects workers.

“We are not going there to advocate for any political party nor cast aspersions to any party 

“I must also state that Cosatu’s participation does not mean the outcome will be binding to the federation,” said Losi.

She said their Central Committee mandated the federation to convene its own alliance’s Conference of the Left, with a yet to be determined date. 

“We are making a distinction between tw -the one convened by the SACP, which is the decision of the SACP in its own congress, and Cosatu’s one must be preceded by the alliance summit first."

She could not say whether the Cosatu conference would be attended by the ANC.

Azapo spokesperson Nosipiwo Manona said her organisation accepted the invitation to Friday's conference based on the SACP’s decision to reclaim its space and political identity. 

Manona said Azapo believed the SACP’s conference was a noble initiative to unite the left. 

“Far from being an electoral pact, AZAPO views the Conference of the Left as a platform to consolidate and sharpen the fighting edge of the Left forces and reclaim the content, direction and tempo of the liberation Struggle,” she said.

She said although forming a new leftist revolutionary movement is possible, it is not the Conference of the Left’s objective as there is no plan to force any political organisation into being swallowed by others, or into extinction.

PAC Secretary-General Apa Pooe said his party would participate in the SACP-led event because it believes South Africa requires a serious, principled and working-class-centred conversation about the country's direction.

“The PAC expects the conference to produce practical areas of cooperation based on principle, not opportunism. 

“The PAC will not enter arrangements that dilute its identity or reduce politics to electoral convenience. 

“However, unity in action on matters affecting the people is both possible and necessary,” Pooe said.

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