Johannesburg – The SACP has warned the ANC that retrenchments in the public sector and the current wage dispute could cost the ruling party at the local polls scheduled for later this year.
Presenting a paper on behalf of the party at last week’s ANC national executive committee lekgotla, SACP first deputy general- secretary Solly Mapaila and the organisation’s central committe member Alex Mashilo said the governing party should be “worried” about the “rise of the negative sentiment” among the working class and the poor.
This comes after a fallout between government and public sector unions over the 2018 wage agreement that could have seen salary increases of 4.4% and 5% from April last year. Last month, the Labour Appeal Court in Johannesburg ruled that the wage deal was unlawful and contradicted the constitution as it had become unaffordable to implement since public finances were battered by Covid-19.
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The unions have since threatened to petition the Constitutional Court.
Cosatu president Zingiswa Losi also warned in the same lekgotla against what Cosatu deemed an agenda against workers being pushed by President Cyril Ramaphosa’s administration, citing the wage dispute, among others.
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