Mhotsha laments dwindling membership

Lindiwe Mozola | Tuesday October 18, 2016 17:44

 

Speaking at the Botswana Bank Employees Union (BOBEU) Biennial General Conference last week, secretary general of BFTU Gadzani Mhotsha noted that contrary to the vibrant and focused unions of yesterday, today it is not uncommon to find most unions having departed from their core mandate and pursuing other interests.

“Whereas as a federation and indeed all other unions have noble intentions to advance the cause of workers in this country, we are nonetheless concerned about the current state of unions in the country,” he said.

Mhotsha explained that there are some expectations of a properly running union ,which some unions in the country lack, leading to conflicts and divisions.

He said some of the challenges are recapturing some of the political power through  a robust drive to ensure that the youth take centre stage in trade union movements, and also aggressive strategies on how trade unions can reverse the trend of declining membership, which he said is common nowadays.

Another major factor that has befallen many unions is electing leaders that are incompetent to lead, said Mhotsha. He said that they must engage prospective leaders to tell them what they know about trade unions, particularly their ability to lead as well as their vision for the union.

“Shun divisive pretenders. I call them pretenders purposely because no leader worth his/her salt sows amongst members a spirit of division and hatred. “Such people should not be put into our leadership. Therefore I wish to caution you against electing leaders who are not competent to lead,” he said.