Trade Unions and Party Politics pot

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Edited by Björn Beckman, Sakhela Buhlungu and Lloyd Sachikonye
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Published by HSRC Press
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First published 2010
 ( ) 978-0-7969-2306-6
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 (-) 978-0-7969-2308-0
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Preface vi
Acronyms and abbreviations ix
1
Introduction: Trade unions and party politics in Africa 1
Björn Beckman and Lloyd Sachikonye
2
Autonomy or political aliation? Senegalese trade unions
in the face of economic and political reforms
23

Alfred Inis Ndiaye
3
Disengagement from party politics: Achievements and challenges
for the Ghana Trades Union Congress
39

Emmanuel O Akwetey with David Dorkenoo
4
The failure of Nigeria’s Labour Party 59

Björn Beckman and Salihu Lukman
5
Trade unions, liberalisation and politics in Uganda 85

John-Jean Barya
6
The labour movement and democratisation in Zimbabwe 109

Lovemore Matombo and Lloyd M Sachikonye

7
Unions and parties in South Africa: C and the 
in the wake of Polokwane
131

Roger Southall and Edward Webster
8
Serving workers or serving the party? Trade unions and
politics in Namibia
167

Herbert Jauch
9
Trade unions and the politics of national liberation in Africa:
An appraisal
191

Sakhela Buhlungu
Contributors 207
Index 208
Contents
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vi
Preface
    a conference that was held at the Parktonian
Hotel in Braamfontein, Johannesburg, from 21–22 July 2006, hosted by
the Sociology of Work Unit () at the University of the Witwatersrand.
It preceded the World Congress of Sociology that was organised by the
International Sociological Association () in Durban the subsequent week,
where a meeting of the ’

s Research Committee on the Labour Movement
(44) was coordinated by Eddie Webster and Sakhela Buhlungu of .
As 44 is global in its orientation, the idea was to hold a special pre-
conference focusing on Africa, the host continent of the World Congress.
The pre- conference was a joint undertaking between , the Politics
of Development Group, Stockholm University, and the Agrarian and Labour
Studies Department at the Institute of Development Studies (), University
of Zimbabwe. It built on a network of labour scholars, including an earlier
workshop in Harare that resulted in a 2001 book on liberalisation and the
restructuring of state–society relations in Africa, edited by Björn Beckman
and Lloyd Sachikonye, as well as a symposium in Harare in July 2002, also
organised by the . Trade unionists were invited to the conference and joint
papers by labour scholars and unionists were encouraged, as reflected in
this book. The president of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (),
Lovemore Matombo, and other leading Zimbabwean unionists contributed
actively. The Congress of South African Trade Unions (), the leading
trade union centre of the hosting nation, was well represented. One session
was chaired by Zwelinzima Vavi, the  general secretary, and South
African unionists contributed to panels and debates. The Zambia experience,
not covered in this book, was presented by a unionist. The conference also
involved union-based scholars from the African Labour Research Network
that brings together union-linked research outfits, such as South Africa’s
National Labour and Economic Development Institute (), the Labour
Resource and Research Institute of Namibia, the Labour and Economic
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vii
Development Research Institute of Zimbabwe, and the research units of
Ghana Trade Union Congress, Zambia Congress of Trade Unions, and
the Nigeria Labour Congress. The director of  oered a lead speech
to one session. Although African in focus, the conference contained a

comparative element, taking advantage of the presence of labour scholars
from non-African countries who had come for 44, including Rob Lambert
and Peter Evans who served as discussants and rapporteurs. A comparative
paper drawing on the Indonesian and South Asian experience by Olle
Törnquist of the University of Oslo was also presented but is not included in
this all-African collection. Funding for the conference was provided by the
Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, a foundation closely associated with the German
Social Democratic Party and specially concerned with the union–party link.
A Swedish research grant (Sida/) allowed African participants to attend
the subsequent Durban  conference and the meetings of 44. Both the
conference in Braamfontein and the subsequent 44 meeting in Durban
were ably coordinated by Anthea Metcalfe on behalf of  and the three
cooperating institutions.
Although originating in the 2006 Braamfontein conference, the
chapters of this book have been developed further to take account of
subsequent developments. Some are new altogether, including the South
Africa chapter by Roger Southall and Eddie Webster that seeks to make
sense of the Polokwane events. The Zimbabwe situation has continued to
deteriorate and some of the participants in the workshop, including the 
president, have been subjected to brutal violence by the henchmen of the
regime. The concluding chapter by Sakhela Buhlungu, one of the editors,
is also a fresh contribution to the debates. We are happy to include Herbert
Jauch’s piece on Namibia, also specifically written for the book. Sadly, the
continued repression of independent unions in Egypt has prevented the
inclusion of a chapter by Rahma Refaat, a scholar–activist from the Centre
for Trade Union and Workers Services, who contributed eectively to the
discussions in Braamfontein and Durban.
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viii
We are grateful for the financial support provided by the Faculty of

Humanities at the University of Johannesburg towards the production of
this book.
The book is dedicated to Eddie Webster, a South African labour
scholar, who has been instrumental in advancing the field of labour studies
globally, and whose achievements were celebrated in Johannesburg in June
2009 to mark the occasion of his ocial retirement from the Department of
Sociology of the University of the Witwatersrand. We wish him a continued
productive life!
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ix
Acronyms and abbreviations
 All Africa Trade Union Federation
– American Federation of Labour–Congress of Industrial
Organisations
 African Growth and Opportunity Act
 African National Congress
 Afrique Occidentale Française (French West Africa)
 black economic empowerment
 Confédération Nationale des Travailleurs du Sénégal
 Central Organisation of Free Trade Unions (Uganda)
 Congress of South African Trade Unions
 Convention People’s Party (Ghana)
 Confédération des Syndicats Autonomes
 Economic Partnership Agreement
 Export Processing Zone Act (Namibia)
 economic structural adjustment programme
 European Union
 Forces du Changement
 Federation of South African Trade Unions
 Federation of Uganda Employers

 Federation of Uganda Trade Unions
 Growth, Employment and Reconstruction
 Ghana Trade Union Congress
 International Confederation of Free Trade Unions
 Institute of Development Studies (University of Zimbabwe)
 International Labour Organisation
 International Monetary Fund
 Independent National Electoral Commission
 International Sociological Association
 Labour Relations Act
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 Movement for Democratic Change (Zimbabwe)
 Member of Parliament
 Marxist Worker Tendency
 National Council of Trade Unions
 National Labour and Economic Development Institute
(South Africa)
 National Constitutional Assembly (Zimbabwe)
 National Executive Committee
 National Economic Development and Labour Council
 non-governmental organisation
 Nigeria Labour Congress
 National Liberation Council (Ghana)
 National Organisation of Trade Unions (Uganda)
 National Resistance Army (Uganda)
 National Resistance Movement (Uganda)
– National Resistance Movement–Organisation (Uganda)
 National Social Security Fund (Uganda)
 National Union of Banks, Insurance and Financial Institutions
Employees (Nigeria)

 National Union of Local Government Employees (Nigeria)
 National Union of Namibian Workers
 Ovamboland People’s Organisation
 Parti Démocratique Sénégalais
 Public Order and Security Act (Zimbabwe)
 Parti Socialiste (Socialist Party, Senegal)
44 Research Committee on the Labour Movement (of the )
 South African Confederation of Trade Unions
 South African Communist Party
 South African Congress of Trade Unions
 structural adjustment programme
 Social Democratic Front (Ghana)
 Société Nationale des Télécommunications du Sénégal
x
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 Syndicat Unique et Démocratique des Enseignants du Sénégal
 South West Africa People’s Organisation
 Sociology of Work Unit (University of the Witwatersrand)
 Trades Union Congress (Ghana)
 Trade Union Congress (Britain)
 Trade Union Congress of Namibia
 University of Cape Coast (Ghana)
 United Kingdom
 Uganda Labour Congress
 Union Nationale des Syndicats Autonomes du Sénégal
 Uganda Peoples’ Congress
 United States of America
 Uganda Textile, Garments, Leather and Allied Workers’ Union
 Uganda Trade Unions’ Congress
- Zimbabwe African National Union-Patriotic Front

 Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
 Zimbabwe Federation of Trade unions
xi
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1
Introduction: Trade unions and party politics in Africa
Björn Beckman and Lloyd Sachikonye
Labour movements and political parties
    of enhancing their political influence through
engaging with political parties while simultaneously protecting their
autonomy? Do they use political parties to transform society or are they part
of the status quo? Are they primarily concerned with protecting the special
interests of a small and dwindling wage-earner population or are they voicing
the grievances of a wider popular constituency? These are the core questions
addressed in this volume about the politics of Africa’s labour movements.
The volume looks specifically at the way in which trade unions engage with
political parties either by being part of them, taking a lead in their formation,
or refusing to join party politics altogether. There is a strong tradition
globally of close union–party relations. In Europe in particular, trade unions
have played a crucial role in the formation of social democratic or labour
parties. Here there is a prevailing notion of the ‘labour movement’ being
composed of two wings, a union wing and a party wing. Unionists are often
recruited into leading party positions and unions play a key role in funding
‘their’ parties. They are also occasionally, as in the British case, granted
bulk voting rights in party congresses. In a number of European countries,
especially in the northern parts, social democratic or labour parties have
played a dominant role on the political scene, as a governing party, a part of
a governing coalition, or as the mainstay of the political opposition. There is
a built-in conflict between being part of a government, actual or prospective,

and negotiating a collective agreement on behalf of your members. Union
1
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2 TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS
leaders are often accused of betraying their immediate constituency either by
supporting the policies of their immediate party allies or in order to ensure
privileged access to political power for the leadership itself. The emergence of
communist parties after the First World War was linked to political divisions
within the labour movements over the wider societal role of labour and, in
particular, over a ‘revolutionary’ or ‘reformist’ road to political power. Where
communist parties became ruling parties in a one-party context, as in the
Soviet Union and its allies, trade unions lost much of their independent clout
although they often retained privileged access to government and welfare
benefits. In much of Latin America and in Asia, the strong links between
trade unions and political parties were reproduced along similar lines to
those in Europe. However, unions have occasionally been fragmented on
party lines, as in India where each political party, including the Hindu
nationalists, operates their own unions. This is similar to the situation
reported in the Senegalese case in Chapter 2. The colonial experience has left
its mark on the union–party relation with trade unions playing an important
role in liberation movements, often being incorporated into a dominant
political party that claimed to represent the emerging nation. This, we shall
see, is central to the African historical experience.
Labour movements are politically contested, both by those who
identify themselves as labour and by those who are part of a different camp,
either as employers or as governments that seek to ensure modes of control
and regulation in line with strategies of their own. Central to the labour
movements, however, is the notion of a common interest as determined by
the position of labour in production. In both the social democratic and the
communist traditions, there is the notion of a conflict between labour and

capital, between employees and employers, although obscured in the case
of ruling parties and collective forms of ownership. In the post-colonial
situation, the conflict is often suppressed with reference to wider notions of
national liberation and national development. How do contemporary African
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INTRODUCTION: TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS IN AfRICA 3
trade unions strike the balance between such wider commitments and collec-
tive bargaining on behalf of workers in individual workplaces? How do their
ties to political parties affect this balance?
Unions engage in politics most directly by intervening in the political
processes and institutions that regulate and control labour relations and the
price of labour, that is, labour legislation, labour courts, and government
labour departments with their officials engaged in monitoring the system.
To what extent do they depend on links to political parties in advancing
their position in the workplace? Governments and political parties differ in
their views of these things and workers therefore get involved in politics in
order to ensure labour-friendly outcomes. But how can workplace matters
and issues of wider national development be separated? Conditions of work
are fundamentally affected by the regular supply of reasonably priced water,
energy, transport and communication, and other factors that are essential for
production and employment. Unions therefore also engage themselves politi-
cally in order to influence conditions of production in the interests of their
members. Similarly, the value of wages depends on developments outside
the workplace, on consumer prices, the costs of housing and producing a
family, the services needed to ensure the health and education of workers’
dependents, and the care offered for the elderly, disabled and unemployed.
This, too, becomes an area where unions are under pressure from their
members to inf luence politics. Political parties and political actors are differ-
ently committed in this respect, thus affecting the allegiances of unions
and workers. Programmatic differences of ideology and macroeconomic

policy contribute importantly to unions’ political identifications. Apart from
causing unions to engage politically at the local level, these differences also
bring them into confrontation with international financial institutions and
development agencies that have their own agenda and views of an appro-
priate policy framework. Unions are commonly seen as a stumbling block to
international strategies of privatisation and neo-liberal reforms of trade and
property rights.
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4 TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS
However, international institutions, the International Labour
Organisation () in particular, take an active part in producing norms that
commit governments to certain standards of labour rights. Over the years,
unions in Africa have appealed to the conventions produced by the , often
ratified by African governments, in order to uphold their right to organise in
the face of repressive governments. The  is a tripartite body that involves
governments, employers and employees alike. What collective stake do
they have in advancing labour rights? Does it suggest that a union-based
labour regime is part and parcel of an international agenda? Trade unions
in economically advanced countries often immerse themselves in support of
unions in post-colonial societies. Trade union rivalries at the international
level tend to reproduce themselves at the level of national trade union
politics. Party–union links were central to such foreign involvement, espe-
cially at the time of the great power rivalries of the Cold War. The political
autonomy of trade unions was emphasised by one side at a time when the
other side pushed for their incorporation in the revolutionary strategy
pursued by the party. Although Cold War trade union politics disintegrated
with the collapse of the Soviet Union, union–party links inherited from that
period have continued relevance. This is demonstrated, for instance, in the
cooperation between the Congress of South African Trade Unions ()
and the South African Communist Party () over issues of succession and

policy orientation in the African National Congress () (see Chapter 7).
Labour relations in individual countries are affected by international union
solidarity where external bodies carry with them their own notions of union–
party relations. The workshop that preceded this volume, for instance, was
supported by the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, a foundation closely associated
with the German Social Democratic Party.
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INTRODUCTION: TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS IN AfRICA 5
The African experience
Historically, African trade unions have been active in broad popular
struggles for independence and liberation (Freund 1988). They have often
been central in resistance to authoritarianism, fascism and dictatorship
(Kraus 2007). This meant extending their concerns and mandate beyond
workplace issues and labour-related matters. It required their engagement in
wider social and political alliances, both with similar-minded groups in civil
society and with political parties whose programmes reflected the concerns
and interests of the workers. While seeking to enhance the entitlements
of workers, African labour movements have demanded social spending
on a political platform. To this end, the movements have sought to build a
‘rights-based agenda for development’, making civil and political liberties
accessible to a broad spectrum of the polity (Jose 2002: 14). Experiences
from elsewhere suggest that civil and political liberties are essential precon-
ditions for converting the economic interests of workers into rights and
entitlements. Unions have allied themselves to groups and movements that
share their values and concerns. This has enabled the labour movements to
reach out to a larger population than those directly engaged in wage work,
so enhancing their legitimacy and promoting their views on development,
equity and justice. This is the case with their role in nationalist and libera-
tion movements. For this purpose, they have also developed relationships
with political parties, sometimes participating directly in governing parties

and alliances. In some instances, the unions themselves have provided the
core of the political opposition, as in the case of Zimbabwe, discussed in
Chapter 6. More commonly in the African context, unions have stayed out
of government, in some cases developing a platform for ‘social dialogue’
which allows them to have input into the policy process. In other cases the
relationship to the government has been based on mistrust and confronta-
tion, as in the Zambian case where unions were instrumental in the alliance
that facilitated the post-Kaunda transition but failed, despite their success
at the polls, to ensure any significant influence in government, let alone
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6 TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS
succeed in reforming the labour regime (Akwetey 2001). In Ghana, unions
have deliberately decided to stay out of party politics, largely in an attempt to
avoid being roped in by either side in what has turned out to be a two-party
contest. While strengthening their political autonomy, just as in the Zambian
case, the Ghanaian unions have failed to ensure much influence on the state
(Akwetey 2001).
In the post-colonial situation, African unions were directly affected
by the policies of the Bretton Wood institutions – the International Monetary
Fund and the World Bank. Their resistance to the structural adjustment
programmes (
s) promoted by these institutions and by foreign donors
was central to union experiences (Beckman & Sachikonye 2001; Sibanda &
Nyamukapa 2000). There has been continued pursuit of neo-liberal policies
on most of the continent, although the 
s have been replaced by Poverty
Reduction Strategy Programmes, also pushed by the international financial
institutions. Yet, trade unions continue to be at the forefront of resistance to
the policies of privatisation and neo-liberal reform. Have they had an impact?
Have they been able to offer organised political leadership to wider social

forces that share their concern? Have their relations to political parties both
in government and in opposition been able to give direction to their political
intervention? The questions of links to political parties and the defence
of union autonomy have become part of this effort to resist a prevailing,
internationally imposed hegemony at the level of economic policy.
The crisis of Africa’s wage-earning economies
Africa’s wage-earning classes are currently in disarray. After independence
they grew fast with the expansion of the public economy. As states sank into
indebtedness, the position of the wage-earning economy was undermined
(Beckman & Sachikonye 2001). State-led national projects were in crisis and
governments were under pressure to adjust. Wage employment was badly
hit and unions sought to disengage from the state–corporatist order which
seemed to have lost its capacity to deliver. Unions resisted retrenchments,
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INTRODUCTION: TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS IN AfRICA 7
cuts in wages, privatisation, and the deterioration of social services. They
demanded greater autonomy as well as inf luence on the direction of govern-
ment policies. Yet, unemployment in the formal economy was high and
growing fast. Formal employment patterns were undermined by the growing
proportion of casual, part-time and subcontracted workers. Manufacturing
in particular was badly hit by the liberalisation of foreign trade and the rise
of major low-income export producers elsewhere. Sectors such as textile and
clothing have experienced rapid deindustrialisation under the impact of the
flood of cheap imports. Overall, wage employment has not been sustained
despite the growth in some services, including telecommunications. In most
of Africa, trade unions have been shrinking in membership.
A major challenge to the credibility of organised labour as representing
the workers is the size of the informal economy and the process of informalisa-
tion. Most workers are not employed on an indefinitely full-time basis at the
workplace of the employer. Most survive by participating in activities where

there is no formal employer as a bargaining counterpart. Moreover, most of
Africa’s population are farmers, traders or craftsmen. Trade unions represent
a small minority of the working people of Africa and it is not surprising that
parties are able to marginalise them politically. Small and shrinking unions
engage in a struggle for survival in the face of falling real wages, deindustri-
alisation, privatisation, outsourcing and casualisation. Can they still play a
role in politics? Can their own grievances be transformed into wider political
leadership? Is organised labour capable of offering voice and leadership to a
wider range of popular forces? Can it build a parliamentary constituency of its
own? Are trade unions capable of developing political responses that go beyond
the immediate issues of employment and wages? In parts of the continent, we
have seen the emergence of new grassroots movements which seek to provide a
voice for sections of the popular classes that fall outside the immediate domain
of organised labour. Do they represent an alternative social force, a true
popular alternative to an increasingly marginalised trade union movement,
unable to voice wider popular grievances? For many, notions of a new ‘social
movement unionism’ seem to offer a road out of what they argue is the dead
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8 TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS
end of formal unionism. Is it the ability to engage with wider social forces and,
in particular, to play an active role in the organisation of the informal economy,
which makes unions meet their wider political responsibilities (Bieler et al.
2008)? Can the unionised workers and their leaders in particular be consid-
ered a ‘labour aristocracy’ that caters only for those already relatively secure
and privileged?
It has long been recognised that large anonymous workplaces are
conducive to collective consciousness and organisation. Similarly, it is
acknowledged that the predominance of self-employment, fragmented
class relations and multiple class identities is usually a poor basis for the
emergence of alternative forms of popular democratic organisations. In

organisational terms, it gives wage labour an advantage over the small
producers and traders that dominate numerically the African scene. The
scope for intervening in politics, however, also depends on the way particular
social groups are situated in the dynamics of the political economy, including
their insertion globally. How central is wage labour to the contradictions
that constitute these societies as peripheral? This, of course, varies strongly
between African countries, depending on the nature of the political
economy – some, for example Senegal and Uganda (see Chapters 2 and 5), are
dominated by an agrarian-based export economy while others, such as South
Africa and Nigeria (Chapters 7 and 4), have been able to develop a substantial
wage-earning population, both in industrial production and in services. The
size and nature of the wage-earning class vary between countries, including
those where public sector employment is dominant and where commodity
production plays a significant role. The political importance of unions is not
just a numerical issue but concerns the strategic location of organised labour
in the economy. Simultaneously, the issue of alliances and the relations
between labour and other groups in society become central in understanding
the political role of trade unions.
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INTRODUCTION: TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS IN AfRICA 9
Alliances: Trade unions, civil society and democracy
Post-colonial societies are engaged in a complex task of nation building
and economic reconstruction. In many instances, state institutions have
been appropriated by individuals and groups who use them to serve narrow
personal and sectional interests. Some societies have been penetrated by
international agencies in pursuit of their own agendas. In both cases, states
have failed to establish solid roots within the local political economy, roots
that are capable of offering direction to or enforcing the accountability of
either popular or ruling class forces on the ground. It is therefore common
to look to civil society organisations as a possible source for reconstructing

the state. Of course, both intervening agencies from outside and local
political groups have their own notions of what kind of ‘civil society’ will be
supportive of their aspirations. For some, entrepreneurial classes capable of
ensuring market-oriented policies are central to their notions of civil society.
Others look for the organisation of groups that are expected to infuse the
state with some level of popular legitimacy (Harriss et al. 2004; Törnquist et
al. 2009). How central is an organised working class in this respect? In the
African context, a recent collection (Kraus 2007) demonstrated how labour
was at the forefront of the struggles for more democratic institutions and
democratic rule that swept Africa during the tail end of the last century.
Vibrant, militant and independent trade unions, it is argued, provided a
bulwark against authoritarianism. Critical to the achievement of organised
labour in this respect was its ability to strike alliances and provide political
leadership to a wider range of social forces, including the forces battling
apartheid in South Africa. How sustainable was this transition to liberal
democracy? The cases reported in this volume’s study point in different
directions. In the Senegalese case, unions played an active role in over-
turning an effective one-party state, supporting the opposition led by Wade,
only to find new streaks of authoritarianism entrenching themselves in the
state. In Nigeria, unions failed to have any significant impact on the ‘return
to democracy’ in 1999 that was at first greeted with much expectation,
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10 TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS
despite repeated attempts to challenge the policies of the state, especially over
petrol prices. We are yet to see the demise of the Mugabe regime, despite
more than a decade of valiant union resistance, including an active role in
the formation of an opposition party. In the Namibian case (Chapter 8, this
volume), it is argued that unions have been effectively subordinated to the
one-party state. In South Africa, ’
s spectacular intervention in influ-

encing succession in the  at the Polokwane conference in December 2007
(Chapter 7) may suggest that the labour movement has been able to retain
the political clout that it demonstrated in the anti-apartheid struggles. Yet,
it may be argued that such intervention carried few gains for the rank and
file of the labour movement, whose authority was appropriated by a narrow
stratum of ambitious union officials. It is a contested issue.
Some of the alliances may have built-in mechanisms that ensure the
subordination of unions, even substituting for the building of strong union
organisational structures. Does a comparison between the Ghanaian and the
South African experience point to differences in this respect? In the former
case, the disengagement of Ghana’s Trades Union Congress from party
politics went hand in hand with an awareness of huge organisational deficits
that the leaders were anxious to address. In the South African case, 
may continue to create the impression of a powerful federation, not least
after its dramatic intervention in  succession politics at Polokwane. Yet, it
may well be that politically influential national centres, such as , are
outmanoeuvred by their party allies once victory is achieved. The risk is, of
course, particularly great if the organisational life of the individual industrial
unions is weak. There is no doubt that political parties are anxious to ensure
union support at the time of elections. But can they be trusted once they are
voted into power? How easily are unions marginalised in such alliances?
Should they be more concerned with putting their own house in order?
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INTRODUCTION: TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS IN AfRICA 11
The crisis of neo-liberal globalisation
The dramatic collapse of neo-liberal globalisation in 2008 suggests a new
urgency to the alternative development paths advocated by organised labour.
Unions in the west competed for state attention in infusing resources
in support of affected industries to save employment and the ‘national
economy’. Unions everywhere have been consistently suspicious of or hostile

to the policies of neo-liberalism, privatisation and deregulation. Do they have
an alternative to the market-driven politics that currently faces a major loss of
popular confidence? Some unions think so, which is why they keep organ-
ising themselves politically and trying to intervene in the political process.
In the African context, while so far largely involved in defensive strategies
within a hegemonic neo-liberal paradigm, the current crisis may open up
space for a return to the popular aspirations for modernisation and social
welfare that informed the struggle for national liberation. The political power
of labour does not lie only in its strategic location in the workplace and its
capacity to organise, but also in the power of its ideas. The historic alliances
that have existed between labour and political parties need to be reconsidered
in the context of the new global economy.
Trade unions and political parties: The options
This volume, in exploring the experiences of trade unions in seven African
countries, points to two major options confronted by all of them. One relates
to the conflict between autonomy and political engagement, the other to the
substance of the social transformation envisaged. Are trade unions able to
intervene politically to influence the direction of public policy? How do they
intervene most effectively? Is it as part of a political party, whether in govern-
ment or opposition, or should unions maintain their independence from the
political actors of the parliamentary arena? Can organised labour assert its
influence directly on the state as an independent pressure group? What avenue
do tripartite negotiations that include both government and employers provide
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12 TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS
for influencing policy? Autonomy, on the one hand, and influence, on the
other, provides a key dimension of unions’ engagement with political parties,
as discussed in this volume. There is clearly a tension between the two but they
are not necessarily contradictory. Some unionists see closeness to government
and the ruling party as a means of enhancing influence. Does this necessarily

imply loss of ‘autonomy’ or can the two, as argued by the  leaders, be
combined? Others argue, as in the Ghanaian case, that disengagement from
political contestation on a party basis is a precondition for political influence.
How effectively has disengagement been used as a strategy for influencing
policy or does it imply accepting the rules of the game as laid down by others?
Issues of autonomy versus influence cannot be separated from a second key
concern confronting the unions, that relating to the substance of the policy that
is envisaged. Is the concern primarily one of ensuring that they can engage
effectively in collective bargaining on behalf of their members? Do unions
have a vision of a different social order? Is this why they engage themselves
politically? Clearly, the decision of the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions
() to promote the formation of a political party of opposition sprang out
of dissatisfaction with the current political order of that country. Of course,
central to that dissatisfaction was the failure of the regime to listen to the
grievances of the workers, especially those voiced through the unions. The
decision of  to throw itself behind a change of leadership in the 
was prompted by a critique of the economic policies of the Mbeki government
and a belief that a more union-friendly and less neo-liberal policy regime was
possible. Will Jacob Zuma bring the expected change? Most importantly, on
whose behalf are unions intervening politically? Is it to serve the narrow self-
interests of union careerists concerned with creating the right conditions for
their own climb to power, as some critics would argue? Or are they spear-
heading an alternative social order, a ‘democratic developmental state’ capable
of delivering employment and social welfare to the masses that are currently
excluded? Who is defining that alternative social order and who is ensuring
that those who provide its mouthpieces are accountable to the wider popular
constituency in whose interests they claim to act?
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INTRODUCTION: TRADE UNIONS AND PARTY POLITICS IN AfRICA 13
Southern Africa: Incorporation and resistance

What do the country experiences tell us? Are the unions capable of
enhancing political influence through engaging with political parties
while simultaneously protecting their autonomy as a popular democratic
force? Are they capable of asserting an alternative political agenda? Are they
transforming society or operating in the context of a status quo or perhaps
even defending it? Are they protecting the special interests of a small and
dwindling wage-earner population or acting as the ‘vanguard’ of a wider
popular constituency?
The disappointment with the failure of unions to offer leadership to
a wider range of popular forces is most strongly articulated in the chapter
on Namibia (Chapter 8). The National Union of Namibian Workers (),
not the only federation but the dominant one and closely linked to the South
West Africa People’s Organisation, the ruling party, has failed, according to
Herbert Jauch, to develop its transformative potential and the wider popular
constituency and support that it once had as a result of its place in the libera-
tion struggle. Instead, it has allowed itself to be incorporated by the ruling
party in its swing to the right. Its protests against the neo-liberal orientation
of the regime have been muted. Foreign capital, as in the case of Ramatex
(discussed in Chapter 8), has succeeded in establishing links deep into the
state. Most deplorable, in this view, is the way in which individual union
leaders have been co-opted into positions of power by the party–state, thereby
obstructing the role of the unions as an autonomous social force. While
unionists in the  claim that being a ‘labour-wing’ of the ruling party
enhances political influence, the author suggests otherwise. In Namibia’s
case, closeness to political power has spelled not only loss of autonomy, but
also loss of the capacity to pursue an alternative agenda.
Is the story of , the leading South African confederation,
engaged in a triple alliance with the  and the , any different? Or is
 merely ‘ahead’ of  in this respect, mirroring things to come?
Much depends on what interpretation is given to what happened at the 

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