South Africa’s Cosatu to hold 15th national congress on September 14–17
In South Africa, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) will hold its 15th national congress from September 14 to 17. Federation President Zingiswa Losi said delegates would discuss workers’ socioeconomic problems and campaigns to address them.
In a column for TimesLIVE, Losi named unemployment, which she estimated at 43.8%, as well as poverty, inequality, crime and corruption among the main challenges. She expressed concern about thousands of workers facing possible layoffs, including in retail and mining.
Claims of trade union achievements
According to Losi, trade unions secured wage increases in the clothing industry and the public sector despite weak economic growth. She claims that the national minimum wage introduced in 2019 raised the incomes of 800,000 domestic workers, 900,000 agricultural workers and more than 4 million people employed in retail, hospitality, security, cleaning, construction and transport.
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Losi also credited Cosatu with contributing to the introduction of the SRD social relief grant for 8 million unemployed people, as well as to the implementation of support measures during the Covid-19 pandemic. According to her data, more than 65 billion rand was allocated from the Unemployment Insurance Fund at the time to assist over 5.7 million workers.
Pensions, electricity and jobs
The federation president said that the two-component pension savings system introduced in 2024 made it possible to release more than 80 billion rand for over 4 million workers with substantial debts. She also recalled Cosatu’s proposals for a 253 billion rand debt-relief package for the state electricity company Eskom.
Losi said Cosatu, together with the government and business, intervened in situations where companies were threatened with closure. Among such cases, she named Edcon, the Tiger Brands canning operation in Ashton and the Premier Group factory in Tulbagh. The federation also opposed the proposed 2% VAT increase in 2025 and suggested increasing funding for the South African Revenue Service as an alternative.
