Military+unions,+strike+weapon,+government,+Terry+Bell,+Business+Report

Business Report, Johannesburg, May 18, 2007
=Military unions take strike weapon out of government's hands=


 * By Terry Bell**

When confronted with concerted extra-parliamentary opposition, governments, to maintain control, have all too frequently relied on the simple fact that they command the monopoly of organised force within society

This means, in the final analysis, the army. Such clashes have a considerable labour movement history, going back to what is now known as the Peterloo massacre of early trade unionists in Britain in 1819. Also in Britain, at the time of the general strike in 1926, chancellor of the exchequer Winston Churchill called in the army and civilian volunteers to break labour power.

In South Africa in 1922, prime minister Jan Smuts called in the army and air force to crush a strike by white miners. Much the same tactic was employed with state troopers in the early years of union organisation on the US coalfields.

There have been many more recent incidents, but the world is changing. And no more so than in South Africa, where our much hailed constitution provides rights that extend to the defence force.

A core of members in our armed forces is also drawn from former liberation movements. It makes for a military that is, at a rank and file level, perhaps more committed to democratic principles than most other similar forces.

This is one of the probable reasons why both the SA National Defence Union (Sandu) and the SA Security Forces Union (Sasfu) declared last week that they were "fully behind" the other pubic sector unions in their looming strike.

There have been mutterings that Sandu may come out on strike, but this is unlikely, as the work of neither the army nor the navy - the air force has very few union members - impacts directly on civilian production or service delivery.

Chapter 20 of the military regulations that are part of the Defence Act prohibits strikes by the military. Internationally, the right of armed forces to strike is a legal grey area.

But the right to form and join a union, and the right of assembly and protest, are inalienable rights guaranteed by the constitution, along with the "right to organise" convention of the International Labour Organisation.

The defence ministry disagreed, but lost the argument in the constitutional court, which held in 1999 that members of the armed forces had the right to form and join trade unions.

However, the Labour Relations Act, which defines legal strikes, does not apply to unions in the military. So there is little threat of the army or navy downing tools.

The position of trade unionists in the military is summed up by Sasfu's deputy general secretary, Themba Hlatshwayo: "We are the final defenders of the constitution and the rights of all citizens under that constitution."

So the military unions are signalling that their members will support fellow public sector workers who will be exercising their constitutional rights. Sasfu is also bound, as a Cosatu member, to back strikes by fellow affiliates.

But although Sasfu has been recognised by the country's largest labour federation as a legitimate affiliated union, this has not yet been accepted by the defence ministry. Questions about such issues raised by the union were e-mailed by me to the defence ministry in January and followed up with telephone calls, but so far there has been no response.

However, this is not a priority for Sasfu, which maintains that a much more important fact is that basic human rights - rights guaranteed by the constitution - are being denied in the military. This applies particularly to gender discrimination and the denial of equal rights to those who are HIV positive.

Says Hlatshwayo: "Women who fall pregnant are dismissed and anyone who is HIV positive, no matter how fit, keen and capable, will not get into the military; or, if they are already in the armed forces, will not be given access to courses necessary for promotion."

Sasfu has also issued warnings about a performance appraisal system that the government is keen to introduce across the public service.

Such a system has been in operation in the military for several years and has resulted in charges that it has led to corruption, favouritism and nepotism, because it is senior officers - "managers" - who decide who is paid performance bonuses.

These reasons, as well as the demands of labour solidarity, now appear to have swung the traditional power of last resort for governments at least partially behind the trade union movement. And the labour movement, in solidarity, will take up the issues raised by their comrades in the military.

Times have certainly changed.


 * From: http://www.busrep.co.za/index.php?fArticleId=3837088&fSectionId=559&fSetId=662**

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