News24 reports that the EFF has announced it intends to establish its own labour union. The political party’s leader Julius Malema addressed a May Day rally in Middelburg, Mpumalanga, on Sunday.

Malema noted that the party's labour desk was often challenged when it intervened with employers as it was not a labour union. He explained that the EFF had a labour desk because it was preparing for a union. "That union will never sell out. That union will always be on the side of the workers. We are preparing to do a union, and not a Mickey Mouse union, who is in cahoots and in bed with the employer," Malema stated. He had a go at the ANC's alliance partner, Cosatu, and pledged that the EFF would overtake Cosatu. According to Malema, SA unions were taking the side of employers, thereby creating a vacuum for the workers which the EFF intended to fill. He did not provide a timeline for the establishment of the EFF's union. Malema also called on EFF members not to be friends of the mining companies, as the "EFF must always be on the side of workers". He said that they only cared whether the mining companies invested in their communities.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Jan Gerber at News24

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