No work - unless our demands are met

“No work before our demands are met!” said the South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) in the Vhembe region after the postponement of a mass meeting scheduled to be held on Monday (this week) in the Vhembe District council chamber.

They are still waiting for feedback from Executive Mayor Mavhungu Leruli-Ramakhanya.

According to the Samwu secretary in Vhembe, Mr Marshal Mahada, this resolution will stand until they are satisfied with the outcome. He said Leruli-Ramakhanya had been consulted by the union about the demands of the workers and she had indicated she would be having a meeting in Polokwane. They therefore resolved to get the workers to go home until their demands were met.

He said among the demands the workers needed to be resolved were the removal of two councillors from the mayoral committee who were implicated in the VBS saga, while some 319 personnel who had been unlawfully removed had to be re-appointed.

During the funeral proceedings at Makhuvha stadium, SAMWU members were chanting and singing songs that Timson Musetsho used to sing during his days when he was picketing.

The two officials, Mr Ronald Mani (49) and the acting national president, Mr Timson Musetsho (49), were shot and killed in separate incidents in Thohoyandou. They were very vocal in protesting against the municipal authorities’ having spent millions of public funds in the now liquidated VBS mutual bank.

Mani and Musetsho were laid to rest on Saturday at the local cemetery in Mbaleni, outside Thohoyandou, where hundreds of people paid tribute to them in a funeral service held at the Makhuvha stadium.

Speaking during the memorial service on Friday, MEC for Community Safety, Ms Makoma Makhurupetje, said the government would not surrender its authority to criminals. She refused to confirm, however, if any arrests had been made.

“We cannot have a situation where leaders continue to run away from their families. There’s a lot of progress and in a short space of time we will see the criminals with our own eyes.”

ANC provincial secretary Mr Soviet Lekganyane said if they found that some people who had been involved in the killing of Mani and Musetsho were ANC members, the party would deal with them in its own way.

“If these things were political and people think that they will get political positions for killing them, they will never get those political positions. There’s no political position which will be acquired out of killing of other comrades. It can’t happen. If we find that among the culprits, they are members of the ANC, we, as the ANC, we also have a way in which we deal with our own members who can’t conduct themselves properly.”

Municipal workers described the two slain officials as heroes who were unflinching against corruption. The workers said the death of Mani and Musetsho was a great loss to the nation.

Musetsho leaves behind his wife, Ms Luvhengo, and four children, Rotondwa, Mpho, Andilsa and Uhone, while Mani leaves his wife, Ms Virginia, and two children, Hulisani and Khodani.

News - Date: 14 February 2019

Silas Nduvheni

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