Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) president George Nkiwane has challenged workers to put pressure on government to abandon policies that result in job losses.
Speaking at a meeting with ZCTU’s Western Region Council in Bulawayo on Friday, Nkiwane said the closure of companies which had affected many workers in Bulawayo was as a result of politics and poor policies.
“We must challenge the politicians over these policies. The companies’ closures affect us workers and we are the ones who must complain about that,” he said.
Nkiwane said the ZCTU had repeatedly lobbied for a pro-poor budget but government constantly turned a deaf ear and came up with policies which benefited the rich.
“At the moment poor people cannot send their children to good schools because the government budget does not focus on the poor. Our survey established that there has been no labour growth contrary to economists’ claims that there was 9 percent labour growth last year,” he said.
He also said the union would confront political parties over violence particularly considering that there was talk of elections.
“We are lobbying the political parties to desist from violence and we want to inculcate a culture of peace in the country.
“We want to educate people to learn to accept defeat during elections because there is no point of going for elections if some people would not accept the results,” said Nkiwane.
