A new dawn eludes the trade unions

MOTELEBANE MOTELEBANE | Friday June 25, 2010 00:00

They have become all knowing philosopher kings who make decisions for their members, often in arrogant disregard of popular positions. They do all this except to address the unfavourable material conditions that have reduced the buying power of the worker to levels of mere sustenance. 

Radio Botswana's Masa-a-sele, (which crudely translates to 'dawn has arrived') interview programme, recently had Samuel Kgaoganang the General Secretary of the Manual Workers Union on air over their impending court case against the breakaway Botswana Government Workers Union (BOGOWU).

Their beef is that the recognition of the union by government is illegal since the union does not represent a third of the workforce as required by law. This matter is before court and as such, it will be left to the processes of the law.

Kgaoganang threw around some statistics claiming that his union represented 33 000 of the 60 000 strong public service whereas BOGOWU represented a paltry 2 400 of which still hold membership cards of the Manual Workers Union. At this point, the radio presenter, Mmoloki Mothibi, popularly known as 'Small Boy', inquired as to whether or not the union had cooked the statistics to favour their case.

Kgaoganang insisted that the statistics were actually provided by government as the employer. He said that in actual fact, government was correcting earlier numbers in which it had said that BOGOWU had 9 000 members. He went further to say that the other reason why government could not give BOGOWU recognition was because the Manual Workers Union had entered into a collective labour agreement with government, which said that government would not recognise any other union that represented manual workers in the public service except the Manual Workers Union.

It is here that the 'legal untruth' comes into play. Collective labour agreements cannot be seen to be in conflict with any of the acts dealing with labour relations or any act at all. The position of the law is that any union that represents a third of the workforce in an industry at any given period of time should gain recognition by the employer as a union representing workers in that industry.

So, such a collective labour agreement cannot exist unless the Manual Workers Union and government are ignorant of the law or deliberately decided that their Joint Industrial Council was above the Trade Unions and Employers Organisations Act in spite of the fact that it owes its existence to the very law.

Caller-after-caller during the call-in part of the Masa-a-sele programme decried what they generally saw as the uselessness of unions in the public service in protecting and advancing the interests of workers.  One caller from Lobatse charged that instead of winning bread and butter victories for their members, union leaders were fighting amongst themselves over money that had accrued from subscription fees.  Another caller, a regular of the programme from Kgalagadi, wondered why one union would want to stop the existence of another, saying that the move was undemocratic and it would rob the workers of choice in the event that they were dissatisfied with a union's services. He saw the infighting in and among the unions as the work of power hungry individuals who were bent on self-aggrandisement.

The unhappiness of Masa-a-sele callers was not surprising. Two weeks ago, a local newspaper reported that the employees of the Department of Student Placement and Welfare were unhappy after being left in the cold by their union, the Botswana Public Employees Union (BOPEU) regarding their suspension from work.

There is also a reported simmering impatience amongst the mass of members of the public sector unions with what they see as failure of the unions to get wage raises for them in the past four years despite the biting inflation, rise in petrol and electricity prices and increases in rentals and transport. The unions are blamed for taking the ruse of the global financial meltdown being used by government as an excuse for putting a freeze on wage increases when their counterparts in South Africa and elsewhere in the world are demanding and getting wage increases for their members.

Footage on SABC channels and France 24 shows workers putting forward their demands for better pay and working conditions while the unions in Botswana appear cozy in some inexplicable contentment.

However, the posturing presented by the union leaders is that of effective unions which are servicing members to their satisfaction. They have become the strict parent admonishing 'naughty political parties' for failing to follow democratic practices and poor running of their houses.

 They also reprimand government for establishing unwanted directorates. Reports of this new role of the trade unions abound in the local newspapers. Yet, observers hold that most of the unions have become the epitome of undemocratic institutes. They argue that a quick check will show that elections are not held, constitutions are tempered with to favour sitting committee members, union resources are used to keep incumbents in power.

Only recently, BLLAWHU withdrew from the Botswana Federation of Trade Unions (BFTU). The resignation was effected by the central executive committee despite the fact that the union' s last extraordinary conference held in Ramotswa a month ago to discuss, inter alia, the union's affiliation to the federation, had resolved that the union should remain a member of the BFTU.

 Members of the union are reported to be very worried about the wanton disregard of resolutions of the union structures in favour of implementing the wishes of the union leadership. Many members say that the union has been turned into a personal property used to advance the interests of a particular individual. Before the Ramotswa extraordinary congress, a meeting of the union's governing council held at Shoshong had resolved that the union should remain affiliated to the BFTU instead of joining the now deregistered Botswana Federation of Public Service Unions (BOFEPUSU).

However, the BLLAWHU president is reported to have eventually prevailed over the central executive committee, which many members of the union see as weak, to short circuit popular voice.  The Botswana Secondary Teachers Union (BOSETU) and Botswana Teachers Union (BTU) have also resigned from the BFTU without the mandate of their membership. All the three unions that are in favour of the Manual Workers Union and BOPEU led the move to re-register BOFEPUSU.

As the union leaders hold endless meetings to plot moves to register BOPEFUSU, as they flirt with party politics and attempt to consolidate false power through populism, they seem completely oblivious to the frustration that is steadily growing within the workers about the unions' failure to address bread and butter issues.  Affordability has become a problem for the working class in the face of wage freeze against the ever-rising cost of living.