SACP+GS+B+Nzimande+to+FAWU,+building+class+power+in+countryside

To FAWU Seminar on National Strategy to Organise Farm workers

 * 14 March 2007, Booysens Hotel, Johannesburg**

=Building Working Class Power and Hegemony in South Africa's Countryside=


 * 1.0 Introduction**

The SACP would like to thank FAWU for extending its invitation to us on such an important topic. We would also like to take this opportunity to thank FAWU for taking this initiative. In addition we would like to express our profound appreciation for the support that FAWU has given to some of our Red October Campaigns, especially in 2004 and 2005, on the questions of land and agrarian transformation and addressing hunger and food security in our country.

The above support is actually an expression of the profound appreciation by FAWU of the fact that the question of the organisation of farm workers cannot be tackled outside of a broader strategy for land and agrarian transformation in our country. This actually constitutes the background against which we would like, in today's input, to place the challenge of the organisation of farm workers.

In fact the SACP regards the issue of the organisation of farm workers in South Africa as one of the most pressing tasks facing South Africa's working class, as part of an overall struggle to organise marginalised, more vulnerable and highly exploited sections of South Africa's working class.

For us as the SACP we have argued that the key challenge during the second decade of our freedom is that of building working class hegemony in key sites of power, including the workplace and the economy. This task shall remain incomplete unless we build working class power and influence in South Africa's countryside, especially in what we call the 'white' countryside.

A few years back, the SACP and COSATU agreed that we must make the second decade of our freedom a decade for the workers and the poor. We committed ourselves to this struggle principally because the first decade of our freedom has, in economic terms, benefited the bourgeoisie and the middle classes, largely at the direct expense of the working class. In fact the conditions of especially farmworkers on the countryside remain largely unchanged, despite a number of positive interventions made by government to improve the general conditions of farm workers and their communities.

To this end our input today would cover the following:


 * A brief overview on the character of South Africa's countryside
 * The need for a comprehensive strategy for land and agrarian transformation, including a rural development strategy
 * End with some of the strategies in organising farm workers


 * 2.0 The character and challenges in South Africa's countryside**

As background to understanding South Africa's countryside, especially in (white) farming communities, it is important to place this against the background of the growth path in our country.

At its policy dialogue last month, the SACP argued that unless our national democratic revolution takes some fairly radical measures to change the current growth path, there is a limit to which we can deepen and consolidate such a revolution. The current growth path runs the risk of either putting a brake on the advance of a working class led national democratic revolution, or risks other class forces hijacking and thus aborting this revolution.

In addition the last SACP Central Committee argued that whilst we have made enormous progress as a country since 1994, including significant government resource transfers to the poor - housing, electrification, provision of water, expanding and deracialised social welfare, etc - and the general strengthening of our democratic institutions, the colonial character of the economy still remains the same. The economy still remains in the hands of the same old colonial classes, principally the white capitalist class.

With regards to the growth and development path, the SACP has consistently argued that to overcome the crisis of underdevelopment and to transform the colonial character of our economy, this must entail purposeful strategic, anti-systemic measures, measures that counter the profit maximising logic of capitalism. There is growing consensus that this requires strong state intervention. However there are quite different tendencies within this consensus, with some believing that such state intervention needs to be principally directed at the "second economy", as opposed to being directed at the transformation of both poles of our economy, and particularly the developed pole.

It is this latter view that the SACP is advocating, since we believe that it is the dominant accumulation path of the developed capitalist sector of our economy that is actively reproducing underdevelopment. Increasingly, also, there is a consensus that transformation requires active popular mobilisation, with the working class at the head, to assert worker power at the point of production, and popular mobilisation.

The strategic objective of the SACP still remains valid: in order to counter the continuous reproduction of mass poverty by capitalism, we must counter the political economy of capital, by fostering the political economy of workers and the poor. This is what we are referring to by our strategic and programmatic slogan - SOCIALISM IS THE FUTURE BUILD IT NOW!

There is no area which reflects the colonial character of our economy, and therefore a crying need for purposeful state intervention and mass mobilisation and organisation than South Africa's countryside.

Like the rest of the South African economy, the accumulation regime in agriculture has not fundamentally changed over the last 13 years. Indeed, South Africa's agriculture and its accumulation regime still represent some of the worst features of the land and agriculture regime under apartheid.

Apart from the two distinct urban/rural enclaves in our economy, South Africa's countryside is in itself divided into two very distinct enclaves shaped over more than a century of proletarianisation of the black rural masses and the massive land dispossession of the majority by both the colonial and apartheid regimes. The one enclave is that of the former Bantustans, and the other is that dominated by agri-business and white owned small and medium sized farms, owned in the main by white farmers and/or their families.

The South African agricultural economy is dominated by large agri-business companies that span the entire production process and marketing. This economy, however, underwent massive changes after the 1973 global economic crisis. It embarked on large-scale mechanisation and increasing export orientation resulting in, amongst other things, massive retrenchments and the eviction of black farm workers. However, the process of evictions had already started in the earlier decades of the 1950s and 60s, as the apartheid regime reconfigured the racial landscape of South Africa in line with what later became the Group Areas Act.

It is however worth noting that the small and medium sized white farmers have also been squeezed by mechanisation, leading to the strengthening of agribusiness and the growing indebtedness of small and medium-sized farmers, and resulting large tracts of unused agricultural land. Government statistics as in 2004 estimated that presently about 17% of arable land in South Africa is lying idle. In some provinces this figure goes as high as 25% and more.

Liberalisation and export orientation of commercial agriculture has deepened rather than lessened post 1994, thus ensuring the growing dominance of agribusiness and very minimal opportunities for the emergence of new, particularly small and co-operative, farming. Government's economic policies seem to have strengthened rather than transformed this accumulation regime since 1994.

Despite the positive economic performance in agriculture, forestry and fishery, black, mainly African, farm workers have suffered greatly and have borne most of the brunt of the continuing accumulation regime in agriculture. They still represent what is, perhaps, the most exploited section of South Africa's working class. For instance, this industry's share of total employment declined from 10,7 in 1996 to 9,9% in 2002. The wage share by this industry has further declined from 32,2% in 1995 to 27,3% in 2002.

Even where one would have thought that the black majority has some potential relative advantage, the accumulation regime and political economy of our countryside remains heavily skewed in favour of the 55 000, predominantly white owners. For example it is estimated that between 43-47% of all cattle in South Africa, about 12% of sheep, and 60% of goats, are owned by the black, and predominantly African population, and yet this section of our people only produce 5% of all red meat in South Africa.

A further reality in the agricultural sector is that what we have on commercial farms is not just farm workers but families living on farms. Not only are these workers being paid starvation wages, but they are, in many instances together with their families, daily subjected to all forms of abuse including violence. Some of these abuses include the following:


 * Long working hours that are not compensated
 * Impounding of their livestock by farmers. In fact the fines imposed on impounded livestock are deducted from their wages, as part of the many deductions made by farmers from the new statutory wage, thus continuing to pay the workers the same old slave wages
 * Less than human living conditions
 * No access to basic services like water, electricity and sanitation
 * Widespread violence as a routine form of discipline and including murders. This is complicated by an untransformed justice system that does not even take up those cases that are reported to them against white farmers

Since 1994 our government has made a number of interventions in the agricultural economy. Some of these include land redistribution and restitution, legislation on security of tenure, labour market reforms including a minimum wage, an agricultural micro credit scheme, and an Agri BEE Charter.

However, significant and welcome as these reforms and interventions are, they have not fundamentally (or even remotely) transformed the current accumulation regime and the political economy of the countryside, as also observed by the July 2005 National Land Summit. Class relations still remain the same, thus continuing to subject the workers and the poor to some of the worst forms of treatment. Agriculture in general, and small and medium farmers in particular, represent some of the most backward sections of capital in South Africa, and the one most strenuously resisting transformation of the countryside.

Of even more concern is the increasing eviction of farm workers and their communities. According to recent research done by the Nkuzi Development Association there have been more evictions between 1994 and 2004, than between 1984 and 1994! Of the total evictions during this twenty year period (1984-2004), 56% of the evictions have happened between 1994 and 2004. It is important that as we discuss the strategy to organise farm workers we also analyse the reasons for this and develop appropriate strategies to counter this. But it is clear that despite a number of legislative measures to curb this, these are clearly not having an impact.

It is rural and women farm workers who bear most of the brunt of all these ills. They are the ones who normally, after long working hours, have to fetch wood, make fire, fetch water and all other chores, especially in conditions where there are no basic services.

However it is important that we should not blame government for all these weaknesses, rather to also work towards the building of social motive forces for rural transformation. It is for this reason that this seminar is very important.


 * 3.0 The need for a comprehensive and accelerated land and agrarian transformation strategy**

Some may wonder why I have to spend time on the above analysis. This is simply because we have to locate the challenge of the organisation of farm workers within the overall challenge of transforming the countryside in our country.

Perhaps our main message to this seminar today is that there is a dialectical relationship (deep interlinkages) between the broader transformation of the countryside and the challenge of the organisation of farm workers. By so saying we should not be misunderstood as saying that we have to first embark on overall transformation of the countryside before conditions of the organisation of farm workers are created. Not at all. Instead, the very transformation of the (white) countryside requires the organisation of farm workers and build their capacity as the main motive force for the very transformation of the (white) countryside.

But it is also important to realise that there is a limit to which we can have strong working class organisation in the countryside unless it is at the same time accompanied by a whole range of other interventions required to change conditions in the countryside.

Perhaps the biggest weakness is absence of an industrial strategy for agriculture, and this matter seems not to enjoy equal attention (as shown by the GDS) as modern manufacturing and services sectors, again partly a reflection of lack of strong organisation and voice for the workers and the poor. For example according to NALEDI figures only about 200 000 of the estimated 1,2 million farm workers are organised into trade unions, with a whopping 1million unorganised!

The most urgent challenge is the role of FAWU and other organisations involved in the struggles for the transformation of the countryside to call for a comprehensive strategy for the transformation of the countryside. The SACP believes that the 2005 National Land Summit laid an important foundation for the development of such a strategy. We therefore hope that this seminar will also include development of strategies on how to drive the implementation of the resolutions of this summit.

One key element of such a strategy is a comprehensive rural transformation strategy, and how the many government programmes (eg public works programmes, social security strategies, the planned increased investment into infrastructure, etc) all contribute towards the development of this strategy. One of its goals should be to dissolve the two enclaves of the countryside as part of addressing rural poverty and transformation.

One other matter that is also important to highlight is the need to challenge the current BEE model for agricultural transformation in our country. The fact of the matter is that the current model is narrow and principally directed towards producing the black counterparts of the very same white farmers. This does not take into account and seek to build on some isolated but successful models of small-scale and co-operative farming that has a larger potential for transforming our countryside, than the current narrow BEE model. We must build on the reality that what we in fact call farmers are farm owners, yet the real farmers are the ordinary farm workers, who daily till the land and look after livestock!


 * 4.0 Some of the key elements of a strategy to organise farm workers**

Our point of departure should be that the organisation of farm workers is integrally linked to a broad developmental strategy for the countryside and that it requires a multi pronged strategy. Our programmatic orientation should be that the organisation of farm workers should also be seen as part of building their capacity to act as the leading motive force for rural transformation.

Some of the elements of such a strategy should therefore include the following:


 * Partnerships with progressive organisations working on land - We welcome the fact that one of the key aims of this seminar is to discuss the kinds of partnerships to be build with both government and progressive organisations working on rural transformation. This is absolutely necessary if we are to create the conditions for organisational access to farm workers
 * Linked to the above is therefore an absolute need for FAWU to play an important role in the general mobilisation of communities on farms around their immediate needs. This provides a fertile ground for build strong trade union organisation on the farms
 * The SACP has committed itself to build People's Land Committees (made up of farm workers, rural communities, progressive NGOs, churches, etc) as part of our contribution towards organising the countryside, with a specific goal of building working class power and influence. It is therefore important that we continue joint SACP/FAWU work on this front as this initiative should simultaneously provide a platform for organisation of farm workers into the trade unions
 * The SACP has also argued that it is important to also consider establishing advice centres to assist farm workers' communities with the many problems they face. This would be another important platform through which farm workers could be organised into trade unions.
 * One of the key obstacles to democratic and trade union organisation of farm workers is the untransformed and usually racist and sexist institutions of the criminal justice system around white-owned farms. The fact that there is widespread abuse of farm workers, including shooting of people being 'mistaken' for dogs, but such perpetrators only getting away with light sentences, has got a lot to do with the character of the institutions of the criminal justice system. For instance in many localities you find that the local (white) magistrate, the prosecutor, the chair of the local farmers association, the station commissioner, the chairperson of the local school governing body, the chair of the local branch of the DA, are all friends who hunt together, go on holiday together, with their children attending the same school. How can fair justice be dispensed under these conditions? We therefore need to a wage a struggle for the urgent transformation of these institutions, as their operation pose a serious threat to the creation of a non-racial, non-sexist and fair justice system in these areas.

Perhaps as part of rolling out such a strategy it is important to identify priority regions in each province where we could initially concentrate bigger offensives in this regard, especially those areas where there is a larger concentration of progressive organisations and networks. We perhaps need to hold strategy sessions in such identified regions soon, in order to come out with appropriate organisational strategies for such areas.

Of particular importance also is that the resolutions and decisions of this Seminar must also be taken to the ANC National Policy Conference and the SACP's 12th Congress, as part of ensuring that our broader movement does indeed prioritise the question of the organisation of farm workers as one of the glaring challenges 13 years into our democracy.

At our Policy Dialogue last month we further committed ourselves to intensify the struggle for accelerated land and agrarian transformation, as well as to work together with FAWU in the organisation of farm workers.

You can continue to count on us as a dependable ally in this regard!

We wish you a successful Seminar!


 * From: http://www.sacp.org.za/main.php?include=docs/sp/2007/sp0314.html**

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