South Africa Miners Strike: Police Firing Kills 34 on spot
South Africa Miners Strike: Police Firing Kills 34 on spot 16th August will remain as a black day in the history of South Africa. The biggest massacre of workers in the post-apartheid days took place at Marikana Platinum mines owned by Lonmin, a company listed at London.
Just after the incident the bourgeois media tried to project it as a fall out of inter-TU rivalry between the African National Congress affiliated National Union of Mineworkers (NUM), the age-old, established but the decaying power, and the ACMU, the rising Construction and Mining Trade Union centre run by and founded by a person, Joseph Mathunjwa, in 1999, who was expelled from NUM for a militant fight at a mine, occupying underground pits for days and compelling management to reinstate the dismissed workers. And South African establishment — the ruling party ANC, the old communist party SACP, the central Trade Union federation COSATU — all de facto tried to shield the police action even while 'condoling' by blaming the 'aggressive' behaviour of ACMU. They had some prior 'evidences' indeed: in January this year some workers died and after the start of this strike on August 10, in between 10/8 and 15/8, 10 workers and 2 guards died in what they call 'fighting between armed groups'; but in workers language that would be actions by armed goons.
But ACMU quickly distanced itself from the militant workers of Marikana, those workers who in thousands assembled and indeed many of them had machetes, spears, clubs or sticks etc which made the scene resembling traditional African tribe people in war ceremony. Surely it had to do this. Though ACMU started its journey with a militant struggle and though it supported Marikana workers' demand, it figures like a fully established TU in the mining-capitalists' journals, it favours green shirts as against red-shirts of NUM and it is eager to show that it is non-communist; even miningmx or other mining bourgeois portals chronicled 'The rise and rise of ACMU'; this central TU believes in peaceful coexistence and fair competition with NUM, the mining bourgeoisie's weekly miningweekly.com introduces Mathunjwa to its readers and reports that the person who impressed Mathunjwa most is the monopolist WINDOWS owner Bill Gates for the latter's 'philanthropy' in Africa & etc. So there is no chance of calling ACMU a 'new' union or a representative organisation of the 'new trend' of workers struggle that is emanating years after the defeat of the international working class movement. It is now widely known that he tried to abate the workers, in his words: ''''I pleaded with them. I said leave this place, they're going to kill you,'' said Mathunjwa, who later broke down in tears.'' There are other reports to this effect too, like: ''On the day of the killing about 3,000 striking miners were gathered on and just below the ''mountain'' (actually a small hill). Joseph Mathunjwa, president of their union, the AMCU, came and pleaded with them to leave to avoid a police attack. The miners refused. Within 15 minutes of Mathunjwa leaving, the police and army laid razor wire fences, separating the strikers from the Enkanini informal settlement, where many of them live. Casspirs (armoured cars), horses and water cannon moved up to encircle the workers.'' It is clear that the workers, who might be accused of acting 'foolish', essentially refused to obey ACMU dictats. To the 'Mail & Guardian' of South Africa the ACMU chief Mathunjwa portrayed Marikana strikers who assembled and faced police bullets inside a trap set by the police as 'disgruntled NUM members' — he didn't take their responsibility!
This independent initiative of the workers, be that foolish or wise in some aspects or other, was also felt in the formulation of the demand. The demand of a wage of 12,500 Rand per month, demanding 300-400% rise, was also chalked by the miners themselves and ACMU supported this demand. The bourgeois press booed this demand of 3-or-4-fold-rise as absurd. The old established communist party SACP, in its condemnation message, didn't forget to mention the 'crisis', ripples of which is being seen to reach South Africa also from Europe, and declining demand faced by platinum industry!! But there are such workers who after 27 years of service are getting 3000 Rand which in real (PPP) terms means nearly Rs10386 per month and that is only 29% of the average wage of SA! Even getting 4000 Rand also means not much, it is less than 40% of average wage figure of South Africa! So it is nothing unnatural about this 'absurd demand', 'un-realistic fight' and absurd sacrifice of 3 dozen lives, considering the derelict condition these rock-drillers live in, who hold their heavy 25 kg vibrating drill machines to break apart the expensive Platinum, often about a mile deep within the mines often at the cost of losing their limbs or even their live. Most often these rock-drillers are from the poorest of certain tribes fit for this inhuman job. The truth of all these are reverberating now in the pits and shafts of other mines now — with the strike wave and clashes already spreading in some other mines of South Africa as it was seen earlier in February last in Impala Platinum mines. In fact defying the ultimatum of the Lonmin Company even after the brutal killings, the Marikana miners are continuing their strike. A worker of RBIPlat said, ''''I have two kids to take care of, I spend R850 for school transport, spend R700 for my travelling and R800 for rental. After all this I am left with nothing,'' said Lebogang Mosito, who claimed to earn R4000.'' Who are carrying the message? Not ACMU, evidently the spark is spreading spontaneously. The richest country by mineral resources, SA, is the most unequal country in the world! A World Bank report says: ''The top 10 percent of the population accounted for 58 percent of South Africa's income, while the bottom 10 percent accounted for just 0.5 percent of income and the bottom 50 percent less than eight percent.'' And when one gets a paltry wage after giving labour for about 30 years, he has to live in a corrugated-tin walled and roofed cage like 'house' with no sanitation facility ... ... there you don't need to teach them to rebel. Though, it may take time. Once these very poor folk, these very labourers stood solidly behind ANC, COSATU & etc; they fought under these leaders; in 1973 another 'illegal' workers strike ushered in the anti-aparthied mass movement, they put their faith on these organisations; but now with them in power they started getting disillusioned. The workers now refuse to listen to the official NUM vice-president who arrives before them with full police protection to convince the workers about the fairness of the co. management's offer. Rather they retort, these old organisations are busy with their politics of power, and they are indifferent to the grass-root realities of the masses. But from disgruntling to rebelling — this transformation needs a time gap. That the workers have started rising in rebellion is evident from the increasing number of 'unrests' in South Africa in the last 8 to 10 years. Nonetheless, the mining bosses will perhaps be able to control the situation after Marikana by manipulating with ACMU, and also with the forces of the establishment: ANC, SACP, COSATU, NUM, etc. After all, the workers are perhaps not yet prepared enough to exert their united pressure through their own conduit. They seem to have started that journey.
[Viola Wilkins sent us a horrifying news-item published on 26/8 in m.news24.com: ''194 cases of assault and attempted murder opened after alleged cell beatings. Battered and bruised, jailed ?survivors of the Marikana mine massacre were systematically ''tortured'' by police this week. Shocking details of alleged ?police torture in cells in and around Rustenburg, North West, emerged yesterday as Police Minister Nathi Mthethwa negotiated with correctional services to take over supervision of the approximately 260 ?arrested miners. ...'' All these reinforce the opinion that the police planned all the atrocities including the mass carnage beforehand 'to teach miners a lesson' at the behest of the mining companies.]
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