WORKING FOR FREEDOM
Ken Luckhardt and Brenda Wall
With a foreword by
Trevor Huddleston
Programme to Combat Racism
World Council of Churches, Geneva
Acknowledgements
Author's Dedication
Chronology
Abbreviations Used in the Text
Foreword
Documentation for this project was provided by many organizations and individuals. The authors are grateful to the following for their assistance: the London office of the South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU); DEFA Research, a department of International Defence and Aid Fund (London); and IDAF for reproduction of photographs belonging to its collection. We would also like to thank the many friends who assisted in the final preparation of the manuscript, especially Don Will and Ken Traynor.
The publication of this book by the Programme to Combat Racism of the World Council of Churches is part of an ongoing commitment to make available research material pertinent to the churches' struggle against racism. Except where specifically attributed to another source, interpretative statements and judgments made in this book are those of the authors; and their appearance here does not necessarily imply endorsement in every detail by the PCR or the WCC.
Cover design: Paul May ISBN No. 2-8254-0677-5
(Copyright) 1981 World Council of Churches,
150, route de Ferney,
1211 Geneva 20, Switzerland
Printed in Switzerland
During the final weeks of writing this manuscript we learned of the vicious attack by the South African military on the residences of the African National Congress (ANC) and the South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU) near Maputo in the People's Republic of Mozambique. Among the twelve ANC and SACTU comrades killed in this assault carried out in the early hours of 30 January was Brother William Khanyile, veteran SACTU leader of the black workers in the province of Natal.
William Khanyile was born in Ekupholeni near New Hanover in Natal in 1935. Because of poverty neither he nor his nine brothers and sisters was able to attend secondary school; instead they were forced to sell their labour in slave-like conditions on surrounding farms. In 1954, William went to work at Edenvale Hospital where he was paid only £6. 10 a month. Low wages led Khanyile, as with thousands of African workers, to join SACTU's £1-a-day campaign in 1958, but as a result of this demand for a living wage he was fired from his job at the hospital.
At this point, Brother Khanyile became a full-time SACTU functionary and joined the ANC as well as assisting with the distribution of the progressive paper of the 1950s, New Age. He became secretary of the ANC in Pietermaritzburg, Natal, during this period.
Khanyile's main task for SACTU was that of organizer of the Railway and Harbour Workers Union in Natal. During the heavy repression directed against the Congress Alliance in 1960, William was arrested for collecting money for SACTU work and for "obstructing" workers at a shoe factory. During this time the apartheid regime declared a State of Emergency; Khanyile was detained for four months and the two charges were never heard in court.
On his release, he was charged again - this time for the distribution of leaflets. In 1963, Khanyile and Antony Xaba were convicted with long sentences during the height of state repression directed against SACTU leaders. He served eight years on Robben Island.
On his release, William was banned in 1972 and restricted to the New Hanover magisterial district for two years. Although his family had left this area - his parents were living in Pietermaritzburg and his wife in Umlazi - his request for transfer to another area was refused. In 1974, after his banning order expired, he joined his wife in Umlazi and once again began making contacts with existing trade unions in Durban. By the beginning of 1975, William Khanyile was once again working deep within SACTU's underground machinery.
Towards the end of 1975, he was detained again, held in solitary confinement and brutally tortured. He stood trial with nine others charged under the Terrorism Act and the Suppression of Communism Act in what became known as the Pietermaritzburg Trial. Khanyile was the only person acquitted; all other SACTU activists were given harsh sentences ranging from seven years to life imprisonment. William left South Africa to continue his SACTU work in the international arena in December 1977.
In 1980, we were honoured to get to know William Khanyile personally during one of his visits to the SACTU London office. At SACTU's 25th anniversary commemoration, Khanyile addressed a large gathering and again stressed the importance of the black working class in the liberation struggle.
Brother Khanyile died on his way to the hospital in Maputo in the early hours of the morning of 30 January 1981 after the house in which he was sleeping was attacked by the racist apartheid troops. He leaves a wife, Eleanor, and son behind.
In dedicating this book to William Khanyile, we do so not to make heroes out of individuals, nor as an attempt to separate individuals from the liberation movement. As the text that follows indicates, there have been many other trade unionists killed by the apartheid regime in the 1970s, and many more in previous decades. Khanyile is, however, the first South African trade unionist to be killed outside the political boundaries of South Africa itself.
This murder is thus very significant and reveals more than before the danger that South Africa poses not only to the subcontinent of Africa but to world peace as well. The racist and fascist attack was carried out on the eve of a conference in Angola to investigate South African crimes against the people in the frontline states. With Reagan and Thatcher in power, the apartheid regime is obviously willing to inflict greater destruction upon the free states of Southern Africa knowing that the western world will turn a blind eye.
The attack on ANC and SACTU residences reflects the real meaning of Pretoria's "Total Strategy". The only alternative to this form of oppression and exploitation is the total victory of the people of South Africa. Brother William Khanyile has laid down his life for that future freedom in a democratic South Africa. To William and his comrades we say: "Hambani Kahle" (Go Well)!
1919 Formation of the Industrial and Commercial Workers Union of Africa (ICU)
1924 Introduction of Industrial Conciliation Act (IC Act)
1941 Formation of the Council of Non-European Trade Unions (CNETU)
August 1946 African Mine Workers Union (AMWU) strike
1948 Rise of Nationalist Party to state power
1950 Introduction of Suppression of Communism Act
1953 Introduction of Native Labour (Settlement of Disputes) Act
October 1954 Dissolution of the South African Trades and Labour Council (SAT&LC)
5-6 March 1955 Formation of the South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU)
1956 Introduction of IC Amendment Act
30 March 1960 African National Congress (ANC) and Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC) banned under the Unlawful Organizations Act
1964-65 SACTU forced underground following massive state repression
1971-72 New wave of strikes by black workers, beginning with action by Namibian migrant workers
1973 Massive strike wave in South Africa
1973 Introduction of Bantu Labour Relations Regulation Act
1973-75 Formation of new worker organizations throughout South Africa
1976 Soweto Uprising initiated by students. Black workers participate in mass Stay-at-Homes
1977 Wiehahn and Riekert Commissions appointed by the apartheid regime
1 May 1979 Wiehahn Commission report (part one) released
1 October 1979 Industrial Conciliation Amendment Act passed, incorporating recommendations of Wiehahn Commission report (part one)
1979-80 Escalation of strike activity by black workers. Membership of independent trade union movement increasing rapidly
AALC African-American Labour Centre
AFCWU African Food and Canning Workers Union
AFL-CIO American Federation of Labour-Congress of Industrial Organizations
AIFLD American Institute for Free Labour Development
ALWU (TA) African Leather Workers Union (Transvaal)
AMWU African Mine Workers Union
ANC African National Congress
ASSCOM Associated Chamber of Commerce
AT&BWU African Trunk and Box Workers Union
ATWU African Transport Workers Union
ATobWU African Tobacco Workers Union
BAWU Black Allied Workers Union
BC&AWU Building, Construction and Allied Workers Union
BCC/CCOBTU Black Consultative Committee/Consultative Committee of Black Trade Unions
BIC Business International Corporation
BMWU Black Municipal Workers Union
C&GWU Chemical and General Workers Union
CCAWUSA Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers Union of South Africa
CIWW Council for the Industrial Workers of the Witwatersrand
CLC Canadian Labour Congress
CNETU Council of Non-European Trade Unions
CPSA Communist Party of South Africa
CUSA Council of Unions of South Africa
CWIU Chemical Workers Industrial Union
E&AWU Engineering and Allied Workers Union
E&AWUSA Electrical and Allied Workers Union of South Africa
EEC Code European Economic Community Code of Conduct
EPSF&AWU Eastern Province Sweet, Food and Allied Workers Union
FB&AWU Food, Beverage and Allied Workers Union
FCWU Food and Canning Workers Union
FOFATUSA. Federation of Free African Trade Unions of South Africa
FOSATU Federation of South African Trade Unions
GAWU Glass and Allied Workers Union
GenAWU General and Allied Workers Union
GFWBF General Factory Workers Benefit Fund
GWU Glass Workers Union
GWUAW Garment Workers Union of African Women
IAS Industrial Aid Society
IC Act Industrial Conciliation Act
ICFTU International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
ICU Industrial and Commercial Workers Union of Africa
IDAF International Defence and Aid Fund
IIE Institute for Industrial Education
ILO International Labour Organization
IMF International Metalworkers' Federation
IUF International Union of Food and Allied Workers
J&GU Jewellers and Goldsmiths Union
JR Job Reservation
LC&DWU Laundry, Cleaning and Dyeing Workers Union
MACWU Motor Assemblies and Components Workers Union
MAWU Metal and Allied Workers Union
MIWUSA Motor Industry Workers Union of South Africa
MWASA Media Workers Association of South Africa
NMC National Manpower Commission
NUCW National Union of Clothing Workers
NUEI&AW National Union of Engineering, Industrial and Allied Workers
NUM&RW National Union of Motor and Rubber Workers
NUMARWOSA National Union of Motor and Rubber Workers of South Africa
NUTW National Union of Textile Workers
OATUU Organization of African Trade Union Unity
OAU Organization of African Unity
PDL Poverty Datum Line
PEBCO Port Elizabeth Black Civic Organization
PFP Progressive Federal Party
PUTCO Public Utility Transport Corporation
SAAWU South African Allied Workers Union
SABEU South African Bank Employees Union
SACC South African Council of Churches
SACTU South African Congress of Trade Unions
SACWU South African Chemical Workers Union
SAIRR South African Institute of Race Relations
SALB South African Labour Bulletin
SE&AWU Steel, Engineering and Allied Workers Union
SEIFSA Steel, Engineering and Industrial Federation of South Africa
SF&AWU Sweet, Food and Allied Workers Union
SWANLA South West Africa Native Labour Association
T&AWU Transport and Allied Workers Union
T&GWU Transport and General Workers Union
TUACC Trade Union Advisory and Coordinating Council
TUC(UK) Trades Union Congress (UK)
TUCSA Trade Union Council of South Africa
TWIU Textile Workers Industrial Union
TWU (TA) Textile Workers Union (Transvaal)
UAM&AWU United African Motor and Allied Workers Union of Natal
UAMW United African Motor Workers
UAW(SA) United Auto Workers (South Africa)
UAW(Can) United Auto Workers (Canada)
UAW(US) United Auto Workers (US)
UNISA University of South Africa
UTP Urban Training Project
WCL World Confederation of Labour
WCR Wiehahn Commission Report
WFTU World Federation of Trade Unions
WM Acts War Measures Acts
WPGWU Western Province General Workers Union
WPMAWU Western Province Motor Assembly Workers Union
WPWAB Western Province Workers Advice Bureau
People only work for other people when they have no alternative: that is, when they have no direct access to the means of production, and so cannot work for themselves. This means that those who control the means of production have power over those who do not.
Although the employer is in principle equally dependent on the worker, from whose work he gets his income, this dependence is not symmetrical. Firstly, the employer almost inevitably has greater reserves than does the worker, who may be faced with starvation as the result of even a short period of unemployment. Secondly, although the employer is dependent on workers, he is not dependent on any particular workers. In the situation in which there are many workers and relatively few employers, it is easy for the employer to keep wages down using the fact that the worker needs urgently to work. That is, competition amongst workers for jobs can produce a situation in which each worker, in order to get a job, is willing to do more work for less pay. The workers' great numbers mean weakness for each individual worker.
Workers can, therefore, only improve their position if they can combine to put an end to competition between themselves. Through combination they can turn their numbers, the source of their weakness, into a source of power. This is the essential purpose of a trade union. However, combination itself is meaningless unless it means combination in action, in refusing to work for a particular employer unless certain wages and conditions are provided. That is, workers can only have some control over their working conditions if they are in a position to say:"I shall not work unless....." and each individual worker can only say this if he or she knows that all the other workers are saying it at the same time. The right to have a trade union is nothing without the right to strike: the right to combine in refusing to work unless satisfactory conditions are provided. This is the only real power workers can have.
Yet, though workers' power and influence rest on the right to strike, there can be few workers who actually welcome a strike. The worker nearly always lives very close to the margin, and any loss of income is a serious matter. A strike always means personal deprivation for workers, but it rarely does so for employers. Trade union officials always dread strikes, since a strike, if it is lost, will weaken the organization, and even if it is won it will place a severe strain on the union's usually slim reserves. It is important to grasp fully these two obvious points, since continuous irresponsible reporting of strikes in countries where they are legal has built up a stereotypical picture in the middle class mind: a picture of workers longing to down tools on the slightest pretext, striking from mere bloodymindedness, and bringing their societies to the edge of chaos....
... in societies where strikes are legal they are relatively rare occurrences, and in all societies workers and trade unionists dislike striking. But what is important is that the threat of strike action should be available to the workers when they negotiate with employers over wages and conditions.
South African Labour Bulletin,
Vol. 1, No. 1, Apr. 1974, p. 28.
In the past quarter of a century, as "the winds of change " have blown across the great continent of Africa and created the new sovereign states out of the old colonies, South Africa has become inevitably the focus of the conflict against racist political philosophy. Precisely because the whole political philosophy of apartheid is based upon the concept of racial supremacy it is certainly right that it should be such a focus.
Moreover even a quarter of a century is not long enough, apparently, to create in the West a sufficiently powerful, international consensus to compel the government of South Africa to change course. The reasons for this phenomenon are not always obvious to those of us who have been fighting apartheid both from within and without for most of our working lives. It seems incomprehensible that racism, embodied, as it is in South Africa, in all the institutions of the state - political, economic, social and religious - cannot yet be seen as a major threat to world peace. But one has only to examine the number of occasions on which the United Nations Security Council resolutions on sanctions against South Africa have been vetoed by the western powers to see that this is the case. What, then, are the reasons?
1 believe that the turbulence of our world today is perhaps the most powerful reason. With the threat of a nuclear holocaust dominating all other issues confronting humanity, it is easy to see that ideological conflict appears to take precedence over racial conflict. It is not so easy to recognize that the two are in fact inextricably linked: that the escalation of race confrontation in South Africa must lead to the escalation of ideological confrontation at a universal level. Indeed it has already happened and the change of administration in the United States makes it appear more, rather than less, likely to increase.
It is also clear that, at a time of severe economic crisis and recession, nations are certain to be more concerned with their own problems of inflation, energy conservation, unemployment and the like than with what appear to be more remote issues. Governments in Europe and the West have been taking their economic temperature for so long that they have almost forgotten to ask what is the true nature of their disease. The connection between world poverty and racial injustice, and the further connection between capitalism and the North-South dialogue, are lost in the more immediate problems of political survival at a national level.
For western nations with their immense investments in South Africa and their long histories of involvement in that country, it is even more difficult to take an objective view of the situation. Still less for countries like Great Britain with its long history of white emigration to South Africa will there be the political will to take effective action. So, over the years, successive governments have been content with pallid statements condemning apartheid and with nothing more than formal voting at the United Nations on issues when action would not have to follow words.
Nevertheless, I believe that the major reason for failure to measure up to the challenge of apartheid has always been a refusal to understand its real meaning. It has been assumed by the vast majority of those who condemn apartheid that they are simply condemning racial prejudice and racial discrimination; that South Africa is only one amongst many nations wherein such prejudice and discrimination are practised; that there is nothing that is uniquely different about it: it is simply the most obvious and the most blatant example. So it follows that a simplistic view of apartheid is very easily transformed into ineffectual protest. And ineffective protest is often more damaging than no protest at all.
This book is a study of the reality of apartheid. It is the history of African trade unionism - which is the black workers' struggle against apartheid - over the last ten years. Its importance lies in the fact (as Joe Slovo is quoted as saying) that "...for all the overt signs of race as the mechanism of domination, the legal and institutional domination of the white minority over the black majority has its origins in, and is perpetuated by, economic exploitation".
But such a study is one which needs massive research in preparation, a real discipline in reading, and refusal to accept the easy and superficial explanations so often given by governments and their representatives.
If we are to understand and fight effectively against apartheid in all its evil manifestations, we must make the effort to study the history of the black workers' struggle of the past fifty years and more.
I was in South Africa during the time when the present government imposed most of the laws which have created and supported apartheid: the Urban Areas Act, the Suppression of Communism Act, the Terrorism Act, the Bantu Education Act, and many more.
It was a great privilege to be involved, however modestly, in fighting those laws and protesting against their consequences. It was an even greater privilege to work alongside those African leaders, many of whom are described in this book, who have suffered such dire penalties - sometimes even to the loss of their own lives, always to the restriction of their liberties - in the struggle. But as I write these few words to commend this book, I am deeply conscious of the urgency of its message. It would be a great tragedy if it were regarded as in any sense a purely academic exercise: a useful historical analysis, a source-book for facts which might be valuable in debate.
During the mass uprisings in Soweto in June 1976, one of the young people involved said: "If we get the parents on our side, we can call out a strike; if we call out a strike the economy will collapse; if the economy collapses we will have black rule in 1977... "
That was five years ago. God knows a heavy enough price was paid by the young people for their hopes and their idealism.
If we do not wish to see strengthening of apartheid and the ultimate total confrontation in violence and bloodshed which will follow, we must have the wisdom to understand the message of this book.
But, having understood it, we must be prepared, wherever we are, and whatever our circumstances, to act.
Trevor Huddleston C.R.
Archbishop of the Indian Ocean
and President of the Anti-Apartheid Movement,
Great Britain
Everyone will agree that the struggle for liberation in South Africa reached unprecedented heights during the decade of the 1970s. Beginning with the strike wave of 1973-74, followed by the massive and popular uprisings associated with the Soweto township in 1976, through to the worker-student revolts of the past three years (1978-80) - all these events, taken together, have contributed to a new crisis for the racist, apartheid regime Combined industrial and political unrest has once again focussed the attention of the world community on South Africa, especially after the decisive victories of the people's movements in Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau and, most recently, Zimbabwe. White minority rule and racist privilege are on the defensive in Southern Africa, but they are not yet defeated.
As with all previous crises and direct threats to tyranny in South Africa, the apartheid regime has been forced by historical circumstances to alter superficially the rules of oppression and exploitation. Serious debates within the white ruling class about how little must be changed "to save apartheid" have at times threatened to become open cleavages. In spite of these inter-ruling class differences, the thrust of the regime's response has been a well-financed and highly sophisticated propaganda campaign designed to appease the "outside world" and to convince it that apartheid is disappearing.
Multinational corporations and western governments that do their bidding continue to aid and abet these efforts of the apartheid regime by uncritically accepting the pronouncements of Pretoria as harbingers of progressive change. To be more exact, these corporations and governments actively oppose the calls of the oppressed people themselves for a total and unqualified isolation of South Africa in all spheres. Freedom for the majority and profits for the few are inherently antagonistic to one another - there can be no other conclusion!
The ability of the apartheid regime to disguise new, more efficient forms of control as programmes of -liberalization" and "reform" often confuses even those groups and individuals who vehemently oppose racism and exploitation and who have no stake in the maintenance of these injustices in South Africa. For the black workers and citizens of South Africa these "reforms" offer nothing but greater burdens, hardships, sacrifice and struggle. Yet abroad, these same "reforms" are portrayed as honest and sincere responses to the people's needs and aspirations. They are not, and we begin this publication by urging all who oppose apartheid to see through this deception and to act collectively and decisively against it.
Let us consider these "reforms". Can anyone seriously believe that the black people of South Africa, and particularly the African majority, have sacrificed and struggled for over three centuries for the legal right to sit with Whites on park benches, or in previously "Whites-only" restaurants? Or to share the same beaches with the white minority? Or to be allowed to have human and sexual relations across the "colour-bar"? Or, more importantly, simply to have their democratically organized and independent trade unions "registered- and hence controlled by the repressive state industrial relations machinery? Or to watch a minority of Africans become a black middle class with a few more material benefits, while the majority languish in the barren "homelands" and wait to lose their birthright and citizenship when the apartheid regime decides their "homeland" is to become a "black-state"?
Nor is there any evidence to suggest that these changes, in some cases obviously cosmetic, in others calculated to enhance state and corporate power, bear any relationship to the real demands for a free and democratic South Africa as enshrined in the Principles of the Freedom Charter set down by the Congress Alliance in 1955. Indeed, a careful examination of these recent "reforms" brought on by the Wiehahn and Riekert Commissions clearly reveals that they have been drafted by the modern day architects of apartheid to make oppression more efficient and social control more effective and complete. Only a small minority of urban Africans could possibly benefit from such changes, and even these gains, as we will document, are more illusory than real without a complete overthrow of the apartheid system.
In order to understand properly why these "reforms" are already being opposed unequivocally by the people, we first need to define clearly the basic structure of apartheid society. The countless laws imposed by a white minority with state power on a black majority with virtually no legal or human rights are sufficient proof that "race" (and racism) is a major dynamic determining the social life of all South Africans. The fact that an African can be legally obliged to live, eat (or not eat), work (or not work), sit (or not sit) wherever and whenever the white authorities so decide is a well-known hallmark of the most vicious system of racism in human history.
However, these facts about apartheid, no matter how gross and repugnant in themselves, do not explain why apartheid exists. To answer this question, one must search beyond the pervasive reality of racism and probe the society at its most basic level - that of economic production and, within that sphere, of the relations between people in the production process. These relations of production answer the fundamental questions of what is produced, how much, by whom and for whom? They also determine to a large extent the nature of and constraints on all aspects of social life and the reproduction of that social life through generations.
With specific regard to apartheid South Africa, Joe Slovo has correctly stated:
.... for all the overt signs of race as the mechanism of domination the legal and institutional domination of the white minority over the black majority has its origins in, and is perpetuated by, economic exploitation (emphasis added). ["South Africa - No Middle Road-, Southern Africa: the New Politics of Revolution, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1976, p. 118]
The non-racial South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU) expressed this basic reality in one of its memoranda back in 1964:
... it must never be forgotten that apartheid and racial discrimination in South Africa, like everywhere else, has an aim far more important than discrimination itself: the aim is economic exploitation.
The root and fruit of apartheid and racial discrimination is profit. [Mark Shope, SACTU Report to Solidarity Conference, Accra, Ghana, 1964.]
Therefore, the starting point for an understanding of the South African system is the definition of apartheid as racial capitalism. In South Africa, as in all capitalist countries, the primary motivation behind all production is the accumulation of profits by those who own productive property, the means of production (land, raw materials, tools, factories). In order to understand how profit is created in the capitalist mode of production, it will be necessary to introduce a few more basic concepts.
Only a small minority ever owns the bulk of the means of production in a capitalist society, leaving the vast majority of people with nothing but their own labour power (or ability to labour). Yet this labour power is of no use to those who "own" it until it is sold and physically combined with the means of production owned by the capitalist class. Hence, owners of these two commodities meet in the market place and enter into an exchange relationship whereby workers sell and capitalists buy labour power. This exchange creates relations of production between capitalists as one class and workers as another.
In return for selling their labour power for a specified period of time, workers receive a wage. When one looks only at the superficial level of the exchange of labour power for a wage, it would appear that the exchange and the relationship which it generates are fair and equitable. But when this relationship is examined in the process of production itself, we can see that the market place has concealed what is in reality a relationship of inequality and, furthermore. the basis of exploitation. How does this come about?
What the worker sells to the capitalist is, let us say, eight hours of labour power per day for five days per week. In the process of labouring for the owner of the means of production for these forty hours per week, the worker will under normal circumstances create a mass of commodities whose value exceeds the value of the wage (i.e. the value of labour power) he receives at the end of the day (or week, etc.). For example, an auto worker may earn $10 per hour (or $80 per day) for producing commodities worth $160 during the same 8-hour period of time. It is this difference between the value of the wage ($80) and the value of the commodities produced by that same labour power ($160) that is the source of profit.
Using our example of the auto worker, it is possible to think of the quantitative difference between the value of the commodities produced and the wage as representing portions of labour time during the 8-hour working day. In this case, the wage ($80) amounts to 50 per cent of the value of commodities ($160) produced by that worker. This means in effect that an equivalent 50 per cent of the 8-hour day, or four hours, was spent in necessary labour and another four hours was spent in surplus labour. The former is what allows the worker and his/her family to survive, whereas the latter is essentially free labour time given by the worker to the capitalist. The value of the commodities produced during this surplus labour time is known as surplus value (unpaid labour) and is appropriated by the capitalist who has private ownership rights over all commodities coming out of the factory.
The process of appropriating surplus value is known also as a process of exploitation, a concept as scientific as any other that might be generated theoretically to explain the workings of the capitalist economy. To ask whether it is possible to have capitalist production without exploitation is the same as asking if the worker can leave the factory after working for only four hours (i.e. after working for the only portion of the day for which he/she gets paid). The answer is obviously NO in each case. This is why capitalists and workers are inevitably in conflict with each other, and why it will be that way as long as capitalism is with us. What benefits one class harms the other, no matter how much either class pretends otherwise. It follows from this brief digression that class struggle provides the principle dynamic and impetus to social change in the history of capitalism..
To return to the case of South African apartheid, the overwhelming majority of producers are black workers - Africans, Indians and Coloureds. These people own nothing but their labour power and must sell it in order to survive. It is upon the backs of these black workers that the wealth of the largely nonproducing white minority has been created. Successive white governments throughout this century have used state power to accomplish one fundamental objective - the control of cheap, black labour in the interests of profit maximization and capital accumulation.
Throughout three centuries of colonialism, industrial capitalist development and western imperialism, black workers have never passively accepted their conditions either as an oppressed people or as an exploited class. Against all the odds, and despite wave after wave of state repression, black workers have struggled relentlessly to build strong trade union organizations to advance their class interests - higher wages, improved working conditions and a better life for all South African workers. On the political front, the same black workers rejected the reformist-cum-reactionary line of "no politics in the trade union movement" Indeed, they have readily joined and in many cases led the popular movements that challenged and continue to resist the entire racist system of apartheid and the exploitative system of capitalism. One of the most remarkable features of South African history is the continuous determination and sacrifice of the black working class in the overall struggle to create a free and democratic South Africa.
This rich history of resistance against colonialism and white minority rule within the context of a rapidly developing industrial capitalism forms an integral link with the recent struggles of the 1970s. State repression directed against the Congress Alliance organizations - especially the African National Congress (ANC) and the South African Congress of Trade Unions (SACTU) - gave the regime only momentary respite in its desperate attempt to maintain the status quo and the profit levels of both domestic and foreign capitalists. The bannings, detentions, banishments, forcing people underground and into exile, and murder of the people's leaders in the recent past have not succeeded in destroying the masses' march down the road to freedom.
New leaders emerge to carry forward the banner of liberation, never forgetting the thousands who have given their lives in previous decades of struggle and sacrifice. Yet significantly, this new, younger generation of militants do not replace the venerated leaders of the immediate past. Rather, they are distinguished by their determination to carry on the traditions of the Congress Movement and to demand the release of the true leaders of the revolution presently serving life sentences in the prisons of apartheid. As black South Africans celebrated the 25th Anniversary of the Freedom Charter in June 1980, the united cry went up all over the country for the release of Nelson Mandela and all other political prisoners - those who continue to command the respect and allegiance of the oppressed majority.
Events of the 1980s will inevitably draw upon the combined industrial and political resistance of the 1970s insofar as this heightened resistance has been the major factor in the present crisis facing the apartheid regime. The primary purpose of this publication is to provide an overview of the black workers' struggle during the past ten years. The liberation struggle led by the African National Congress requires the mass participation of the black working class. That working class, whose sweat and blood have created the wealth of South Africa, must play a leading role in the revolutionary process that transforms the entire society. Only in this way can the Freedom Charter's demand for a free and democratic South Africa for "all who live in W' be assured for present and future generations.
A publication of this length cannot hope to chronicle adequately the wide range of valiant struggles waged by black workers in all corners of South Africa since the early 1970s. Nor is it even possible to document fully events of the immediate present. Crucial developments have taken place at such a pace in recent months that the written word cannot keep pace with the movement of the people themselves.
More modestly, this publication attempts to place the recent workers' struggles in an analytical perspective and thus assist the international community to understand and assess their significance in current South African realities. Beyond understanding is the need to broaden and intensify the resolve of that international community to fulfill its obligation of solidarity with those who must suffer most in achieving liberation. Incomplete coverage of the South African workers' struggle in the western media underscores the importance of all opponents of apartheid undertaking the responsibility of communicating available information in a correct and persuasive manner.
As an illustration, the recent upsurge in both industrial and political resistance in South Africa is unfortunately, in our opinion, often presented without its historical perspective. Strikes in key sectors, general political strikes, opposition to industrial relations legislation, boycotts, etc. are frequently described as though new to the black workers' situation - which of course they are not. Such a piecemeal approach to analysis and related action more often than not creates divisions (e.g. over which group(s) to support) where they need not exist, disunity instead of unity. The ancestors of those black workers presently on the picket lines, of students boycotting apartheid education, of blacks in general facing the bullets of the regime, have endured and suffered through exactly the same experiences in previous decades.
We do not deny that crises are cumulative, and we firmly believe that racial capitalism and the entire edifice of the apartheid system cannot withstand the growing popular resistance. Yet the tactics and strategies - including those emanating from international arenas -- that shape the path of this present challenge gain strength and greater clarity when they are drawn from the lessons of history. This is especially true, it would seem, with the case of the black workers' demands not only for economic benefits per se but, more importantly, for the right to form free and independent trade unions. While the present demand for these "free and independent" trade unions is the banner under which black, particularly African, workers are mobilizing, one must never lose sight of the fact that this same demand has been the hallmark of non-racial and political trade unionism for at least 25 years - i.e. since the formation of SACTU in 1955. Indeed, similar demands extend as far back as the 1920s and 1930s.
Likewise, the strategy of the South African state to control legislatively and politically the black working class has had an amazing constancy throughout this entire century. Everyone who shares the aspirations of all freedom-loving South Africans must be aware of this glorious history so as to avoid the misleading view (consciously advocated by some) that events of the 1970s form a completely unique period in the South African struggle.
For these reasons, we must begin this overview of the black workers' struggle in the 1970s with two short chapters on the relevant historical information. Chapter Two reviews the major trends in the industrial relations legislation that is such a necessary backdrop against which to compare recent so-called "liberalizations". Chapter Three outlines non-racial and political trade unionism in the recent past so that we can chart the progress of the current workers' revolt. From Chapter Four on, the various aspects of black trade unionism in the 1970s are explored in greater depth.
Contrary to popular belief, the state in capitalist society is not a neutral force in social life. Rather, it is that set of institutions (government, bureaucracy, military, judiciary, police) which maintains and reinforces the general social order and more specifically the class structure of inequality based on unequal access to the means of production. To perform this task, the state must have a certain autonomy from the capitalist class precisely to be able to protect the long-term interests of that class and the capitalist system as a whole.
It helps to think of the state as having three specific functions. Firstly, it must create conditions favourable to the accumulation of profits by the capitalist class. Secondly, and following directly from the first function, the state must do whatever is necessary to promote some minimal degree of social harmony between different social classes which otherwise would be locked in continuous conflict; this function is best thought of as the state's legitimization function. Thirdly, when all else fails, the state may employ its monopoly over the physical apparatus of force to quell social unrest. This coercion function keeps people in their places and reinforces the social order. In capitalist society, the state ensures that these three functions are administered whenever necessary to keep the capitalist class ruling, the working class ruled, and to guarantee that the exploited continue to produce an economic surplus (profit).
Where, then, do laws and particularly industrial relations legislation (or labour laws) fit into this model? Generally speaking, the legal system under capitalism works best when it satisfies both accumulation and legitimization, i.e. when it fosters the accumulation of capital by the ruling class but simultaneously is believed to be "neutral" or serving the -cornmon good- (or sometimes -national good") by the citizenry as a whole. Yet there is no reason to make the illogical assumption that labour laws in any way protect labour or, to put it differently, that labour laws are the best protection for working people. It is important to stress at the outset that the strength that flows from a united working class offers more protection to those who create all wealth than all the labour laws that exist in the statute books.
In fact, industrial relations legislation in capitalist society should be initially understood as the principal means by which the state intervenes in the capital-labour conflict and ensures that that conflict takes place within certain institutionalized boundaries. These laws establish the general and specific rules by which both capital and labour must interact, and it should never be forgotten that labour laws in capitalist society are built upon the most fundamental law of private property and its prerogatives. If workers agree to accept the industrial relations legislation, then accumulation and legitimization proceed in a more or less coherent fashion; if they do not, then the state in moments of crisis (real or perceived) will not hesitate to invoke the coercion of the police, or if necessary the military.
With these general propositions in mind, let us turn our attention to the South African industrial relations system as an excellent example of state intervention in the class struggle, made necessary by the unique system of racial capitalism known as apartheid. In a political economy where the black majority exists only to serve the labour needs of the white ruling class minority, the industrial laws became a cornerstone of racial exploitation long before the emergence of apartheid per se in 1948.
Labour legislation defining the parameters of class struggle in South Africa fully complements all the hated laws and institutions better known to the international community - the pass laws, influx controls, bannings and forced removals, and now Bantustans and "black states". By guaranteeing migrant labour to white capitalist farmers and the mining corporations, channelling unskilled or semi-skilled black workers to low-wage industrial capitalist corporations, and ensuring a ready supply of black domestic servants to white households, the state has consistently attempted to improve the efficiency of national oppression and class exploitation.
Throughout this century the industrial relations system has successfully divided the South African working class along colour lines. The effect of this state strategy has been to dissuade and at crucial junctures legally to prevent the rise of non-racial working class unity against a common class enemy. With each potential political and economic crisis the state has devised tighter and more punitive legislative controls to dampen the momentum of working class resistance. Although white workers have generally accepted the relative privileges of racism rather than fight for non-racial unity, they too have lost strength in the process.
Industrial Conciliation Act (1924)
The Industrial Conciliation Act (hereafter, IC Act) of 1924 constitutes the legal foundations of state intervention in the class struggle between capital and labour in this century. Although amended in 1937, in 1956 and again in 1979 (following the Wiehahn Commission), the Act has remained unchanged in its essential function within South African society. Incorporated in the original IC Act by the architects of racial capitalism was the strategy that has since guaranteed and institutionalized a divided working class. The vast majority of workers - the African wage earners - were excluded from the definition of "employee"in the Act and thus ineligible to join legally recognized trade unions. The latter were restricted to white, coloured and Indian workers generally; African women could legally be members of registered unions until they too, like their male counterparts, were forced to carry passes after 1956.
Why, one might ask, was it necessary to draft labour laws that followed colour lines? The answer in its simplicity provides the key to understanding the essential role of the South African state in promoting the development of industrial capitalism throughout this century.
The 1924 legislation was a response to the crisis of the Rand Revolt of 1922, which in turn was the culmination of white miners' strikes in the previous decade. White workers' militant opposition to the mining companies' policy of hiring cheaper African labour peaked in 1922 with pitched battles between members of the South African Mine Workers Union (representing white miners) and government troops sent in by Prime Minister Smuts to defend the property and profits of mining capital. By the middle of March when the Rand Revolt was finally suppressed by the state, over 200 persons had been killed.
The Rand Revolt represented more than a crisis of interrupted production in the mining industry, the economic backbone of South Africa. The very existence of strong trade unions of white workers encouraged the formation of potentially stronger and more threatening unions of black workers. Organizing efforts and strikes by African workers between 1918 and 1921 led the government of the day to realize the urgency of creating an industrial relations system that would preserve labour peace in the interests of those who profit from it. The power and militancy of the working class - white and black -had to be regulated if capitalism was to be saved.
An earlier Economic Commission of 1914 (established to inquire into the white miners' strike of the previous year) had recommended that "recognition (of trade unions) creates responsibility", with the attendant consequence that officials of these unions are "more likely to take the business point of view---. These guidelines were no doubt instructive to those who drafted the IC Act of 1924 as they grappled with the central problem of how to curb strikes and non-racial unity of the South African working class. If it was too late to eliminate white trade unions (as indeed it was), then perhaps the cooptation of this minority of the total working class could be negotiated through labour laws.
The IC Act of 1924 essentially offered white workers and their trade unions a range of economic benefits based on racial privilege in exchange for political powerlessness. White workers' racism or paternalism (which amounts to the same thing) could be easily blessed with material benefits, but in the process white trade unions lost class power with the establishment of a highly formal, bureaucratic and centralized bargaining system. Among the agenda items for white trade unions, however, were the right to bargain for the racial division of labour and at a later date the level of African wages.
The quantitative "gains" made by white workers relative to their black brothers and sisters concealed the more essential defeat they suffered at the hands of the employers and the state. The Act created such a complicated and cumbersome set of procedures that strike activity - the workers' most important weapon - became a virtual impossibility. Where this was not the case legally, it was practically. Statistics clearly illustrate the effect of the legislation on white workers' strike activity and the unambiguous victory of the capitalist class as a whole: between 1919 and 1922 there had been an average of 37 strikes involving 42,087 workers each year, whereas between 1923 and 1929, these figures had dropped to 6 and 393 respectively.
The decline of shop floor militancy amongst white workers was accompanied by the predictable emergence of a conservative (and often downright reactionary) white trade union leadership distinguished by its willingness to collaborate with the bosses. Rank and file membership grew apathetic and in certain industries actually dwindled in numbers, although management lost no opportunity to reverse this trend by stressing the advantages of trade unionism (except to African workers) and in some cases even assisting with organizing drives. Such was the consequence of this great historical compromise by white workers. Therefore, the state had moved swiftly to create the conditions (in this case, through the IC Act) most conducive to capital accumulation. The Act contained stipulations that prevented registered unions from contributing to political causes and, furthermore, prevented the recognition of any role for shop stewards who, according to the mining company spokesmen, "undermined management authority---. Exactly! Hence the importance of their loss to the workers' struggle.
In 1935, a government commission heralded the political significance of the IC Act passed a decade earlier: "(Statutory) wage regulation made unions less militant" and the Act was 'Judged good in principle by employers generally". Within the space of ten short years the South African state had transformed open class warfare between white capital and white labour into its opposite - where class collaboration built upon white workers' sectional (i.e. racist) interests ensured super-profits for the economic ruling class. The IC Act of 1924 also demonstrates that the capitalist state does not need to rely on coercion when it can introduce laws that "peacefully" serve to maximize exploitation.
The Native Labour Act: separate laws for African workers
African workers - the most numerous and most exploited section of the South African working class - have been covered by special racist legislation throughout this century. Numerous Masters and Servants Acts passed between 1856 and 1904 before the formation of the Union of South Africa (1910) legally defined the withdrawal of African labour power as a breach of contract and a criminal offence. These colonial remnants were consolidated without significant alteration into the Native Labour Regulation Act No. 15 of 1911.
African workers consistently resisted this slave labour legislation as they organized trade unions which, although unrecognized ("unregistered" by the state), often forced employers to improve wages and conditions of work. The growing strength of African trade unions immediately before and during the World War II years (see Chapter Three) obliged the state to introduce special legislation to prevent interruptions of expanded production quotas during the war.
A series of War Measures (WM) enhanced the power of capitalists vis-d-vis African workers. WM No. 9 (1942) gave the minister of labour the authority to intervene in disputes likely to impede the war effort and to appoint arbitrators in such a way as to render strikes or lockouts in that industry illegal. WM No. 145 (1942) extended the provisions of WM No. 9 to cover all disputes involving African workers; this Act, unlike its predecessor, remained in effect until 1953 when it was incorporated into the Native Labour (Settlement of Disputes) Act. A supplementary WM No. 1425 prohibited the gathering of more than 20 Africans on mine company property - an obvious legislative attack on the militant African Mine Workers Union that was to lead the infamous strike against mining capital in 1946. These special War Measures failed to reduce the strength or break the determination of African trade unions: there were at least 60 "illegal" strikes of African workers during the war years.
Immediately following the election victory of the Nationalist Party in 1948, the new government appointed an Industrial Legislation Commission of Enquiry (known as the Botha Commission after its chairman) to investigate all areas relevant to industrial relations in South Africa. The Commission filed its report in 1951 and recommended a proposal calling for nominal recognition of African trade unions under the law. It was argued that limited recognition would give the state a more efficient means of controlling unions of African workers; it was also made clear that, even if implemented, this was in no sense a call for equal treatment for African workers either before the law or in practice. In testimony before the Botha Commission, mining and agricultural capital had vehemently opposed recognition of any kind. Likewise, the Nationalist Party's Nazilike philosophers could find no room for such "reformism" as they prepared themselves to launch the grand scheme of APARTHEID. Consequently, the Botha Commission's principal recommendation was rejected and instead the state enacted the Native Labour (Settlement of Disputes) Act of 1953, a piece of legislation designed, in the words of the minister of labour, to -bleed the African trade unions to death".
The Native Labour Act incorporated War Measure No. 145; thus all strikes and lockouts of African workers were illegal. Actions that might lead to strikes and lockouts were, along with sympathy strikes, also made illegal. Stiff fines of up to R1,000 or three years' imprisonment, or both, were provided for in a 1959 amendment to the Act. Additional amendments prohibited an African from representing workers at Industrial Council or Conciliation Board meetings; the collection of trade union dues or contributions to sick benefit funds via "stop orders" (deductions) were also outlawed.
African "pass-bearing" workers once again were excluded from the definition of "employee" in the IC Act and thus prevented from membership in legally registered trade unions. Alternatively, the Native Labour Act made provision for an unwieldy, white-dominated industrial conciliation machinery for African wage earners. This initiative scarcely concealed the state's desire to smash the existing independent unions of African workers.
A bureaucratic labyrinth consisting of Bantu labour officers, regional Bantu labour committees and a Central Bantu Labour Board - all controlled by white administrators - reflected the state's attempt to assume total control over industrial relations for African workers. Instead of allowing legitimate collective bargaining between African workers (through their non-racial trade unions) and the employers, the Native Labour Act called for works committees elected by the workers but restricted to the factory level only. These works committees were to be merely advisory bodies and could not be formed by African workers without the paternalistic consent of management. The workers, however, had no difficulty in understanding the threat these committees posed to their independent trade unions. By 1969, only 24 works committees had been formed.
Anti-government newspapers in the 1950s regularly documented the African workers' resistance to what was termed the Slave Labour Act. A boycott of the separate machinery in the Act effectively defeated the state's plan to smash African trade unionism. The small number of African workers who did form works committees and tried to work within this system quickly discovered through experience that employers worked in close collaboration with the state bureaucracy and, more importantly, the police. Eventually, the state would be required to use coercive repression against the African trade unionism spearheaded by the non-racial coordinating body, SACTU. In the case of the Native Labour Act, the legitimization function of the state had completely broken down.
Apartheid trade unionism
It is a common tactic of all fascist governments to launch an attack first upon the weakest and most defenceless section of the people, and having achieved their ignoble aim, then to proceed with the stronger sections. One may state with certainty that if the native workers are deprived of their freedom today (i.e. through the Native Labour Act - authors), the European, coloured and Indian workers will be deprived of theirs tomorrow.
[Quoted in Luckhardt, K. and B. Wall, Organize or Starve: the History of the South African Congress of Trade Unions, Lawrence & Wishart, London, 1980, p. 113.]
This perceptive comment made in 1952 by Solly Sachs, banned leader of the Transvaal Garment Workers Union, outlines the crucial relationship between the Native Labour Act for African workers and extensive revisions made to the IC Act in 1956. Not content with depriving the majority of African workers of equal treatment under the law, the architects of apartheid were determined to enshrine racism into every institutional structure of the registered trade union movement as well. This attack on the universal principles of trade unionism conformed with the overall thrust of nationalist policy being imposed on South African society throughout the 1950s. Revisions to the IC Act in 1956 (1) forced further racial divisions within already registered trade unions, and (2) provided for the racial classification of jobs, or what came to be known as "job reservation".
Firstly, the amendments attacked the independence of registered unions by:
Loopholes in these amendments were discovered and effectively eliminated with further revisions in 1959.
Clearly the objective of this legislative assault was to promote white and politically conservative domination of the registered trade union movement. Where this could not be accomplished directly, the goal became that of separating white workers from progressive and influential coloured and Indian trade union leaders determined to advance the cause of non-racial trade unionism. The "essential industry" clause was invoked against the Food and Canning Workers Union (a SACTU affiliate and stronghold) in 1959 in an attempt to break the militancy of the rank and file - but without success!
Secondly, Clause 77 of the 1956 amendments to the IC Act introduced the infamous Job Reservation provision into existing legislation. This empowered the minister of labour to reserve any job for members of a given "racial" group and was defended in parliament by the minister as "...a precautionary measure to safeguard the standard of living of the white workers of South Africa and to ensure that they will not be exploited (sic) by the lower standards of living of any other race". Again, 1959 amendments to Clause 77 strengthened the autocratic prerogatives of the minister in imposing this statutory colour bar upon industrial production.
Legal entrenchment of Job Reservation only institutionalized what had been customary practice since the earliest days of capitalist development in South Africa. The "industrial colour bar" originated in the exploitative conditions for black miners and was later extended to other sectors of the economy under the guise of the "civilized labour policy" in subsequent decades.
Until the introduction of Clause 77, most of this racial discrimination at the point of production remained outside the statute books per se, an important exception being the Native Building Workers Act (195 1) which denied equal pay to African building workers. The Apprenticeship Act of 1922 (and as amended in 1944) did not openly discriminate against African workers, but it had the effect of denying equal opportunity of training insofar as black workers generally could not qualify because of low educational levels. Thus, the Job Reservation clause in the 1956 legislation stands out not so much for its uniqueness in the history of South African production but more for the blatant racism and fascist arrogance of the Nationalist rulers.
The 1956 legislation was in a sense the culmination of one era and the beginning of another. It reflected the Nationalist Party's determination to flex its political muscle to eliminate or at least compromise all progressive leadership in the registered trade union movement. Most such leaders had been effectively removed from their democratically elected positions by the purges imposed under the Suppression of Communism Act of 1950 (see below). For African workers and their popular leaders, the regime seemed honestly to believe that the Native Labour Act machinery - coupled with coercion through the use of physical force when necessary - would sound the death knell of African trade unionism.
Bantu Labour Relations Regulation Act (1973)
Throughout the latter half of the 1960s there was a definite decline in the growth of African trade unionism. This, of course, can be explained by the severe state repression directed against SACTU and the Congress Movement early on in the decade. Nevertheless, the process of rebuilding independent organizations of exploited black workers continued as a new generation of leaders stepped forward to assert the principles and carry on the tradition of struggle and sacrifice established by SACTU before it was forced to operate underground and in exile.
The strike wave that hit South Africa in 1973-74 (see Chapter Four) brought class struggle back to the forefront of South African politics. Beginning in Durban (Natal), the strikes soon spread throughout the country and signalled another crisis for the apartheid state and the accumulation function it undertakes on behalf of the capitalist class. In direct response to the strikes the regime enacted the Bantu Labour Relations Regulation Act to transcend the Native Labour (Settlement of Disputes) Act of 1953.
In many respects the new legislation was merely an extension of the 1953 Act. Powers of the works committees were marginally widened, but these bodies could only exist in a factory if a liaison committee did not already exist. The liaison committee was a creation of the 1973 legislation called for by employers' organizations who wanted joint management worker bodies which served a purely advisory function and were clearly of little or no benefit to the class interests of African workers. The role of the capitalist class in drafting the 1973 Act is evidenced by the fact that liaison committees were not even part of the original government recommendations. Both types of committees - works and liaison - could exist only at thefactory level and, as before, no legal recognition was accorded to trade unions that represented the true aspirations of the black working class.
The industrial relations machinery created by the 1973 Act proved no more popular with black workers than previous legislation. In late 1974, it was estimated that only 5 per cent of the potential committees had been formed in the some 30,000 factories in the country. For the state-controlled initiatives to succeed there had to be some minimal trust expressed by the workers themselves. As one observer explained:
They (the African workers) reject works committees on the grounds that they are formed by employers.... they are actually controlled by employers in that it is the employer who introduces these committees, especially at times of labour unrest, and the workers suddenly wonder why management approaches them on these questions. As one worker put it: "Is it feasible for a man with whom you are quarrelling to give you a gun in order that you might shoot him?"
[Quoted in R. Davies and David Lewis, -Industrial Relations Legislation: One of Capital's Defences", Review of African Political Economy, No. 7, Sept-Dec. 1976, pp. 66-67.]
As long as workers are exploited under racial capitalism in South Africa they will continue to form their own independent and democratic trade unions. This means that state-initiated alternatives - endorsed by the bosses - will be totally ineffective and rejected by the majority of black workers.
The 1973 legislation does provide for Africans to have direct representation (without the vote) in Industrial Council proceedings, although the actual person(s) must be approved by the minister of labour and the (white) Bantu labour officer. Also, for the first time in industrial relations legislation the African workers are not totally denied the right to strike. The path to a legal strike is, however, most circuitous (as it is for workers in registered unions) and of little relevance in any case. African workers have not withdrawn their collective labour power according to the legality of such action - they have done so (and continue to do so) because of their own consciousness that it is their labour power to do with as they choose.
Influx controls
Migrant workers from the Bantustans are processed through labour bureaux which are more like cattle markets than anything else. Men register there as work seekers then hang around to await recruitment. They wait for days, weeks, months. Then comes the great day. The recruiting agent arrives. Two hundred and fifty men line up. He wants one hundred and eighty-four labour units for the company he represents. He walks along the line and beckons those he chooses. This one looks wrong, this one looks young and teachable, this one is too old, this one looks too thin. This one says he doesn't want to work at eight rand per week because he was paid eleven rand in his last job. He must be too cheeky.---Get back in the line, I don't want cheeky boys." Those who are not picked must wait weeks, maybe months, until the next recruiting agent comes: The "cheeky'2 one won't argue next time. He will be ready to accept whatever wage is offered. His children are starving and a little is better than nothing.
[3 South African Labour Bulletin, Vol. 3, No. 9, Nov. 1977, p. 18.]
Thus far we have outlined legislation conceived and implemented by the state to prevent workers, particularly Africans, from organizing along class lines and struggling against capitalist exploitation. Another set of laws, generally referred to as influx controls, impose tremendous restrictions on the freedom, mobility and sale of African labour power on an individual-by-individual basis.
Influx control measures deny freedom of movement and largely determine employment opportunities for African workers. Residence restrictions and job allocations are made by white bureaucrats on the basis of which section of white capital most needs black labour at the given time. Africans "superfluous" (in the government's terminology) to these fluctuating demands are continuously removed from the "white" urban areas to the "homelands" /Bantustans. Only a small proportion of Africans have permanent rights of residence in the urban areas, while the majority constitute an oscillating mass of "temporary sojourners", migrants and commuters, whose life decisions are totally circumscribed by apartheid regulations from the cradle to the grave. (These influx controls will be discussed in greater detail in subsequent chapters.)
Reference books: The Bantu (Abolition of Passes and Coordination of Documents) Act of 1952 requires every African sixteen years of age or over to carry a reference - generally called a '6pass" - book which contains up-to-date particulars of name, identity number, employment, domicile, etc. Failure to produce this reference book on demand is grounds for immediate arrest. Foreign Africans entering South Africa as migrant labour are required to obtain an identity document which serves the same purpose.
Residence restrictions: The most significant legislation affecting African residence in urban areas has been the Bantu (Urban Areas) Consolidation Act of 1945, and as amended over the years. The general effect of this Act has been to systematically remove Africans from urban areas unless employed - "serving the needs of the whites- - there. In 1952, all urban areas became "proclaimed" areas subject to these controls. Insofar as the white ruling class equates "white" areas with South Africa, the following statement expresses the racist thinking behind this legislation:
We do not regard the Bantu working in South Africa - even ifthey have always been working here, for whatever length of time, even it if is from the day they are born until the day they die - as being present in any entrenched fixed capacity; we regard them here in a casual capacity.
[Hansard, 9 May 1972.]
Section 10(1) of the Urban Areas Act details four categories of Africans who may qualify for varying degrees of permanency and security in the urban areas. All others are required by law to leave these proclaimed areas after 72 hours. Section Tenners (those with Section 10 rights) can, however, relinquish these "rights" through violation of a wide range of minor crimes or acts of omission. As the specifics of all these laws have been subject to slight modification under the Riekert Commission, we will discuss them in detail in Chapter Seven.
Labour bureaux: Since the Nationalists came to power in 1948, numerous acts have been passed that give the state greater control over the funnelling of African labour power. This is accomplished through a complex system of labour bureaux. In theory, no African can be legally employed unless s/he and the employer are registered with an appropriate labour bureau. In practice, illegal employment has been widespread as both employers and workers (for different reasons, of course) flaunt the inefficient and cruel system.
Government rhetoric in the 1965 regulations lists six functions of labour bureaux:
This last objective has failed miserably, even within the context and priorities of the legislation itself, and this inefficiency was a major factor prompting the formation of the Riekert Commission.
Labour bureaux operate not only in the "white" urban areas, but also in the rural areas and Bantustans through tribal, district and territorial bureaux. These latter bureaux have worked in close harmony with recruiting organizations for private mining and agricultural capital as the goal is to force exploited Africans into these two spheres to the maximum extent. Although labour bureaux are in theory supposed to consider the registrant's preference among seventeen job categories, no law requires that labour bureau(crats) implement this provision - on the contrary, there is considerable evidence to show that it is seldom practised!
Finally, labour bureaux fail to accomplish the stated objective of "harmonizing supply and demand". Rather, they merely hide the massive unemployment of African labour generated by the apartheid economy. This is accomplished by removing these highly visible "idles and undesirables" from the urban areas. An estimated 25 per cent of the -economically activeblack labour force is presently unemployed, and the situation is worsening. The high incidence of desertion from labour contracts also points to the general conclusion that labour bureaux are institutions of force and compulsion necessary to the apartheid system of labour exploitation.
Security legislation - apartheid's range of legal coercion
[Most of the information in this review of security laws has been taken from Jonathan Bloch's "The Legislative Framework of Collective Bargaining in South Africa", UN Centre Against Apartheid document, May 1978; and Carole Cooper, Strikes in South Africa: 1979, South African Institute of Race Relations, Johannesburg, 1980.]
It is impossible to study labour laws in isolation from the security legislation ushered in by the Nationalist Party since 1948. These security laws form part and parcel of the normal means by which the state controls the black working class and attempts to destroy its resistance. Thus, it is essential that one has some general overview of the nature of these laws and how they are the---other third", so to speak, of the state's legal offensive against the black working class after industrial relations legislation and influx controls.
Of particular importance are (1) the Internal Security Act, (2) the Terrorism Act, (3) the Riotous Assemblies Act, and (4) the General Law Amendment Act. By invoking these Acts singly, or in combination, the state has over the years turned black workers' efforts to organize and defend the interests of labour into criminal offences punishable by severe sentences of up to and including life imprisonment. Employment opportunities are often taken away from persons victimized by these laws even if they manage to escape long terms in the prisons of apartheid. The remainder of this chapter will briefly summarize each of these four acts.
1. THE INTERNAL SECURITY ACT, No. 44, OF 1950
Formerly known as the Suppression of Communism Act, this Act defines "Communism" so broadly as to include any doctrine or scheme which aims at bringing about any political, industrial, social or economic change by unlawful acts or omissions. If workers by striking contravene the terms of labour legislation they lay themselves open to prosecution under the Internal Security Act.
In 1961, 194 African bus drivers in Port Elizabeth went on strike over the question of minimum wages and equal wages. They were arrested and fined. Four years later ten of the strikers were charged with furthering the aims of Communism by taking part in the strike. In September 1965 they were convicted of belonging to a banned organization and of furthering its aims by taking strike action in 1961. They were sentenced to four and a half years' imprisonment, subsequently reduced on appeal to one year.
For application of this law against progressive trade unionists in the early 1950s, see Chapter Three.
2. THE TERRORISM ACT, No. 83, OF 1967
It is a criminal offence to do any act or to conspire, etc. to do so with the intention of endangering the maintenance of law and order, if the act had or was likely to have had one of a number of results, such as the crippling of any industry or undertaking or industries or undertakings generally or the production or distribution of commodities or foodstuffs or the causing of substantial financial loss to any person or the state.
This Act was used in the prosecution of militants involved in the organization of the general strikes of 1976. Penalties for its contravention are a minimum of five years' imprisonment and a maximum of the death penalty. It is quite clear from reading the terms of this Act that almost any strike action by workers could be considered in violation of the Terrorism Act.
3. THE RIOTOUS ASSEMBLIES ACT
First introduced in 1914, and amended many times since, this Act makes it illegal for African workers (or any other workers, for that matter) to form pickets or to take part in "illegal gatherings---. Interestingly enough, the Act was introduced in 1914 to prevent white workers from pressuring blacklegs and scabs in strikes on the goldmines and railways. It provided for the banning of meetings, etc. and made it a crime to picket the homes or work places of blacklegs or scabs or to annoy them or their families.
Under the 1974 amendment to this Act, a magistrate may prohibit any gathering for a period not exceeding 48 hours if he has reason to believe that the public peace would be seriously threatened, while the minister of justice may prohibit any gathering in order to maintain public peace or to prevent the engendering of racial hostility, with no limitation on the duration of the prohibition. A gathering is defined as "any gathering, concourse of procession of any number of persons".
Since 1976 the minister has banned "any gathering- in South Africa except sports meetings, meetings held inside buildings, and specially authorized meetings. Such a ban would thus make it impossible for persons wishing to strike to congregate in the open. This particular provision can also work to the detriment of a resolution of the conflict before a strike breaks out. For instance, it makes it difficult for trade union officials to mediate in the dispute as it prevents them from holding a meeting of, or talking to, workers outside the factory. Officials, in order to carry out their functions, have to find a hall conveniently situated where workers can meet and this is not always possible.
Under the ban it becomes an offence for any person to: (1) convene a gathering or to encourage, promote or by means of threats cause people to attend the gathering or to preside over or address it; (2) to print, publish, distribute, or in any manner whatever, circulate a notice convening it or advertise it or in any other manner make it known; or (3) to attend it.
If a person is charged with contravening the ban the onus is on the accused to prove that he has no knowledge of the prohibition. The sentence for offence (1) is imprisonment for a period not exceeding one year, and for offences (2) and (3) a fine not exceeding R100 or imprisonment of a period not exceeding six months. Further sections in the Act also have a bearing on the holding of a strike. Under Section 12, it is an offence for a person unlawfully to enter premises to induce unlawfully any person to cease work or from returning to work.
4. THE GENERAL LAW AMENDMENT ACT, No. 76, OF 1962 (THE SABOTAGE ACT)
Sabotage as defined in the act includes any wrongful and wilful act which inter alia injures, puts out of action, obstructs, tampers with, etc. any of the following, among other things: the supply or distribution of light, water, power, fuel, foodstuffs or water, postal, telephone or telegraph services; free movement of traffic; any movable or immovable property of a person or of the state. It includes also any attempt. instigation or encouragement to commit such an act. The penalties range from a minimum of five years' imprisonment to the death penalty.
It is difficult to imagine a strike in the public sector which did not injure, put out of action or obstruct either the supply or distribution of the services listed above. It is even more difficult to imagine a strike in any sector which did not injure. put out of action or obstruct the property of any person or of the state.
Hundreds of SACTU leaders and members were held in detention under this Act in the early 1960s, for periods of 90 and 180 days. Many were in solitary confinement for long periods during these detentions, and many were tortured before they were released.