Cosatu blasts China trade SAPA | 18 sep
CAPE TOWN - South Africa's trade negotiations with China should be suspended until their effect on the local economy had been studied, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) said yesterday.
In an address to the Textile and Clothing Workers' Union in Cape Town, Cosatu president Zwelinzima Vavi asked why government rejected calls for a moratorium and questioned its pursuit of a policy that deepened the country's unemployment crisis.
He said Cosatu had pointed out that, in particular, the bilaterals with China would be harmful to the nation's industries.
"We have never had a positive trade balance with China, and the deficit soared to R9,9 billion in 2003. This happened side by side with the job-loss bloodbath in the manufacturing sector and in the economy in general," he said in a prepared speech.
Vavi said clothing imports from China grew from 50 percent of all clothes brought in during 2001 to 75 percent in the first three months of 2004.
He said government needed a "major mind shift" if it wanted to achieve the ruling party's promise of halving unemployment and poverty by 2014.
The current public works programmes were not a long-term solution to unemployment, he said, calling for an industrial policy which would form part of a strategy to restructure the local economy to create jobs and ensure growth.
"Without restructuring the economy, the dream of building a better life for all will increasingly be discredited as nothing but an empty slogan to maximise voters' support during the election period - nothing more."
The Cosatu leader said one of the union's biggest concerns was government's "consistent inaction" in the face of a deepening unemployment crisis.
Vavi also mentioned a Cosatu recruitment drive aimed at increasing membership to four million by 2009, and re-energising the federation's jobs and poverty campaign.
Referring to the "travelgate" scandal at Parliament, he said the values of the South African liberation movement were solidarity, selflessness and putting the people first.
"Unless Parliament and the ANC act proactively to deal with these matters, good and ethical MPs and other political leaders will be tainted with the same brush."
Both former president Nelson Mandela and President Thabo Mbeki had pointed to the need to overcome "crass materialism" and to serve the people first.
"Sometimes you wonder how a provincial or national government leader or member of parliament can in a short period of time manage to buy farms worth millions, although their official salaries can never be adequate to finance such an opulent lifestyle."
Vavi warned that corruption would soon become endemic unless it was campaigned against.
He called on all communists and trade unionists within and outside government that have substantial business interests to consider resigning their positions, saying "no one can serve the lion and the sheep at the same time".
Vavi also said Cosatu and its affiliates needed to move fast to ensure its leaders did not benefit unfairly from investment companies owned by trade unions.
Such companies should do more to support development, rather than just enrich investment managers.
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Joe Smith wrote:
> They could have titled this article "Asian Boom Leaves Africa Largely Stuck
> in the Colonial Division of Labor."
>
> joe
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <uvj at vsnl.com>
> To: "lbo" <lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org>
> Sent: Monday, September 20, 2004 11:50 AM
> Subject: [lbo-talk] Africa starts to share in Asia's trade boom
>
>
>
>>HindustanTimes.com
>>Saturday, September 18, 2004
>>Africa starts to share in Asia's trade boom
>>
>>Africa still barely flickers on Asia's economic radar screen, but two-way
>
> trade is experiencing a boom that is likely to be sustained as Asia's thirst
> for oil and commodities is matched by Africa's hunger for cheap manufactured
> goods, according to Standard Chartered Bank.
>
>>In a new report, the emerging-markets bank said Asia's demand for Africa's
>
> base metals, timber and oil was likely to stay high as China in particular
> continued to industrialise.
>
>>Africa's principal imports from Asia are cars and electronics, but
>
> Standard Chartered said rice and textiles were also likely to become
> increasingly important.
>
>>"The growing trade ties between Asia and Africa reflect a structural
>
> change, suggesting the trend for trade between the two regions is clearly
> up," StanChart economists Abah Ofon and Bill Xu wrote.
>
>>One of the structural changes is Africa's reduced reliance on trade with
>
> its former colonial powers in western Europe.
>
>>China, for instance, has now replaced France as the primary export market
>
> for Gabonese wood, StanChart said.
>
>>In the other direction, Africa has been Thailand's biggest rice market
>
> since 2000.
> [snip]
>
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>