Sdumo Dlamini warned delegates against being used by capital and white people to march, claiming they are pushing an agenda.

PRETORIA – Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) President Sdumo Dlamini has warned delegates at the federation’s central committee meeting to be careful not to be used by white people or capital to remove a democratically elected government.

Dlamini delivered his opening address at the mini congress at the Saint George’s Hotel in Pretoria earlier on Monday.

There were reports that some unions would table a motion of no confidence in Dlamini after he attended President Jacob Zuma’s birthday celebration and told him supporters wished him well when Cosatu didn’t send him to represent the organisation.

But last week the federation’s central executive committee expressed confidence in the entire leadership of the organisation including Dlamini.

When the programme director asked delegates to welcome Dlamini with a song, there was a brief awkward silence and he then had to directly ask the National Union of Mineworkers to start singing.

Dlamini warned delegates against being used by capital and white people to march, claiming they are pushing a sophisticated agenda.

“Because today they are so confident to a point where they now go out and march – [these] white people.”

This narrative is similar to previous statements made by both the president and African National Congress (ANC) presidential hopeful Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma.

Dlamini-Zuma told ANC members in April when people marched against the president, it was the first time she had heard of banks closing to allow staff to demonstrate, while the president responded to marches by saying they show racism is still alive in the country.

TOUGH DECISIONS

The Cosatu president says the federation will continue to take tough decisions about the ANC, as long as the party continues to follow the wrong path.

Dlamini says Cosatu has a duty to call the ANC to order if need be.

He says the federation was pushed to take tough decisions about the ANC because of the party’s own mistakes.

“When they do all these wrong things, then we shall take the decisions that we’ve taken because we have decisions. We took them sober, right?”

Some of those decisions include a call for the president to step down and the decision to back his deputy Cyril Ramaphosa.

Cosatu’s first deputy president Tyotyo James told delegates to own these decisions.

“We want the current deputy president to be the president of the ANC.”

The federation says its concerned about what it calls the disarray state of the ANC.

(Edited by Winnie Theletsane)

White people are the direct beneficiaries of land theft from black people