Today's Labour News

Engineering News reports that the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa) has decided, after holding a special central committee (SCC) meeting on 12 and 13 July, to suspend its second deputy president Ruth Ntlokotse.

This comes days before it plans to hold its eleventh national congress in Cape Town. The national congress, where Numsa plans to elect new leadership, is due to take place from 25 to 29 July. Numsa secretary general Irvin Jim said Ntlokotse, who is also SA Federation of Trade Unions (Saftu) president, was suspended because Numsa’s SCC “felt that [her] conduct . . . undermined the organisation and its unity.” He indicated: “[Ntlokotse] has defined [herself] outside the collective leadership of the national office bearers. As such, the SCC took a decision to place [Ruth] under suspension, pending a fair disciplinary process of the organisation.” In addition, Jim reported that the Numsa SCC decided that those who disrupted a recent Saftu national congress should not be allowed to attend the upcoming Numsa national congress. Numsa used the SCC to deal with final preparations for its national congress, including preparing the congress documents, the budget, the logistics and policy discussion documents. As part of these preparation, Numsa opened nominations for its national leadership on 13 July. In the run-up to the national congress, Numsa has also been working on relaunching its nine regions – a process that has been concluded, with two-thirds majority voting in favour. As such, eight out of the nine Numsa regions successfully held regional congresses and elected new leadership.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard at Engineering News

Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page