*On Wed, Nov 10, 2010 at 2:29 PM, Baloyi, Aubrey <[email protected]> wrote: * * > > Comrades, > > My view on helping the workers in Aurora, please add your views. > > > > Communist Regards, > > > > Aubrey Baloyi >
* *Establish workers’ control at Aurora* Written by Aubrey Ntsako Baloyi: Tuesday, 09 November 2010 I had a bible next to me before writing this piece. The aim to have the holly bible was to check if one can serve two gods at once, but due to my biblical illiteracy, I couldn’t find the right chapter and its verse. The idea was to give a right quote from the bible itself. It should be easily says you cannot serve two masters. Its either you love one and hate the other. Workers have no choice when it comes to the two masters, capitalism as a cruel master have failed the world and the working class in every corner of the world. It is proposed that the workers be involved in a day to day running of the means of production since eventually the capitalists and the oligarchy will be eliminated. The workers need to be liberated from the chains of exploitation and the means of production to be expropriated from the capitalists and the oligarchy. In brief, they want to socialize the means of production and have a planned socialist economy. SACP and COSATU want to achieve socialism as the only political force which will liberates the working class from the tight chains of capitalists and abolishes private capital and private property concentrated in the hands of the few. This is the revolutionary theory which has been used in many industrialized country to liberate workers, and this revolutionary theory was best articulated by Karl Marx and inherited the name Scientific Marxism (Socialism). In socialism, all the combating heights of the economy should be socialized and put in the control of the workers and the community (stakeholders) around. And I believe the party and COSATU fully agrees with me on the latter. To the point, the former Pamodzi gold mine recently acquired and controlled by Aurora empowerment system, the situation at grotvlei and orkney mines caused me to write this piece. The mines have not been in operation for more than a year now with the president chopping and changing the minister of labor. And it looks like the workers will be penny- less this coming festive. The latter is caused by the situation in these two mines, the capitalists have maximized the profit and they don’t care now. It is highly unlikely that they will go back to work soon, unless the other capitalist comes over to re-exploit them again. It is very bad to have two black capitalists exploiting our thousands brothers and finish by starving them to death with closing the mine. This is possible as cde Alan Woods once said “the small exploiting classes are the minority of society, they couldn’t rule without the help of sub-exploiters and sub-sub exploiters”. The ZUMNDELA minority felt it was right to exploit the working class and leave them with hunger. It is important to name the capitalists before we start lashing at them. The mine was managed by ZUMNDELA capitalists after the other capitalists liquidated the operations. Cdes at large, it cannot be correct that these workers took this long not working and the state is silent while it wants to reduce unemployment. Also, it cannot be correct that we run to the courts to solve these matters. We not going to allow the situation where people who worked their whole lives in these mines cannot be given time to manage and run this operation. We not suppose to read week in week out in the capitalists’ newspapers thatthe workers cannot believe it when they see the menu at the kitchen where they use to have lunch, while going for days without eating. From the labor federation leadership, we are tired to always read your speeches talking about the luxuries of ZUMNDELA capitalists! Those who are close to the family are now gatvol to always read on weekend newspapers that one of the capitalists is owning several car and he just attended some event with his new sport car worth millions of rands. We are tired of the DoL to misuse our court rooms to request UIF to pay these workers instead of demanding. We need to act, SACP and COSATU need to take decisive steps and put hope to these miners. The party needs to revive its mandate and prove its vanguard role. The communists need to come with a winning formula based on the workers’ control revolutionary process bias to the working men and women and the community at large. This is not NATIONALISATION to help few to digest sushi in their sleep and buy sharp nose shoes and dated alcohol. Here we nationalize to put the workers in control. Why don’t we waste the legal fees on getting the permission from the state for these vulnerable workers to run the mine? Why not going to court to get the books and accounts of the mine? Why don’t we put the workers’ control proposal to workers? Why are we not organizing the workers through NUM in the operation to get their view on our proposal? I won’t be scared to mention/suggest we auction the property of the ZUMNDELA capitalists and improve the sanitation, drinking water and basic things which are already appalling from the miners’ residence? SACP will agree with me that if the above question can be answered, this is the basics of socializing the means of production! The only way to save the workers at Aurora from starvation is through workers’ control. Workers have been producing since they worked and are experienced in the work they do in those mines, from the rock-driller, general workers, miner, and shifts supervisors until the mine captains. These are the people who always runned these operations/mines while the capitalists enjoyed air-conditions in their luxury offices. I don’t see why this hundreds of years of experience combined shouldn’t be given the mines to manage themselves. The only thing workers aspire now is to see them back in their jobs, so why not through NUM initiate this debate? Why not form workers’ councils? Why not put our (SACP) Marxism theory into practice? It is not right that we wait for manna to fall from heaven for these workers, if manna ever existed in the worlds of capitalists! In some Latin American (like Venezuela) countries, workers’ control and workers’ management has been one of the solutions for the mines in a situation like Aurora and the idle industries. Workers’ control means exactly what it says; the working class and its representatives in the factories have the rights to the books of the company or industry, to check and control the input and the outputs and complete the management actions. It is through workers’ control where the average working class knows the marketing, the full process operations, finances and the managing of the entire business. It is through workers’ control where workers own the business, 1/3 of the ownership is normally distributed among the community, the workers and the committees. It is not adviced to have the monies shared among everyone according to their efforts invested. Workers should at all level guards against the trade unions bureaucrats not to emerge as capitalists in future since they will be part of operation committees. History have showed that some opportunist unionist have sold down the interests of the workers down the river in exchange with cigars and dated alcohol provided by the capitalists. It is proper to conclude the paragraph with a legit case study “a good example will be the Alcan smelter in Jonquiere, Quebec. Alcan is the largest aluminum producer in the world. The smelter was scheduled to close down in 2014. In early 2004, Alcan suddenly announced that they were going to close the smelter. As part of the defensive struggle, the workers occupied the plant. After this, they reported that the production was higher than it was before the workers had taken control”. I will divorce Marxism if one can tell me that the above is not possible with Aurora. I will conclude by saying, it is best if the vanguard party and the labor movement do something about the Aurora situation. Failure to do so, would be failing the working class. The struggle to have better working condition in the workplace will never be attained if the state machinery cannot even try to bring the ZUMNDELA capitalists to justice. The failed to comply with safety and health acts, failed to comply with SARS and the re-paying of UIF to it’s rightfully employees. This is the same company which hired foreign nationals unlawfully. It’s a pity the workers are still out of their jobs now and the ZUMNDELA capitalists are changing cars like underwear. Soon they will be exploiting our half-naked sisters as trays to serve sushi, and the mini-god’s respond would be we hate black success. It cannot be right that in the country where people go to bed with hungry stomach successful people will be buying several sports cars while retrenching and not paying our workers. Workers in Aurora are not looking for luxuries like sushi, dated alcohol and sports cars. They looking for employment to take care of their families just like the ZUMNDELA capitalists will be taking its families to overseas holidays and enjoy eating on half-naked women. We cannot depend on department of labor to help Aurora workers, this is the state department which neglected to thoroughly deal with the bosses and only resolve to negotiate the UIF to be paid to the employees. I am saying NUM should go back to the people and organize them to run the mines themselves. We are sending the message to the capitalists that we not going to allow them to sabotage the operations in future. This is a workers struggle, whoever stands in our way will be crashed and milled. If the department really cares about the workers, it should force the bosses to bring the back the books of the company back, service provider’s lists as well. PIC should inject the monies to help the workers to run the mine and their loan will be repaid because we can guarantee production and profit if the workers’ control is implemented. The PIC should help in abolishing unemployment rather funding sushi capitalists who maximize profits and forget paying wages to employees. Down with ZUMNDELA capitalists down! Forward with workers’ control at Aurora forward! On Wed, Nov 10, 2010 at 2:29 PM, Baloyi, Aubrey <[email protected]>wrote: > Comrades, > > My view on helping the workers in Aurora, please add your views. > > > > Communist Regards, > > > > Aubrey Baloyi > > -- > You are subscribed. This footer can help you. > Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to > this message. > You can visit the group WEB SITE at > http://groups.google.com/group/yclsa-eom-forum for different delivery > options, pages, files and membership. > To UNSUBSCRIBE, please email [email protected]. > You don't have to put anything in the "Subject:" field. You don't have to > put anything in the message part. All you have to do is to send an e-mail to > this address (repeat): [email protected] . > -- Women and cats will do as they please, and men and dogs should relax and get used to the idea - Robert A. Heinleinwww.kwelaxpress.co.za -- You are subscribed. This footer can help you. Please POST your comments to [email protected] or reply to this message. 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