Inside Labour | Post Office left to die by discord in porous labour movement, writes Terry Bell
Now, just six weeks into the year, it seems the heavy weather has begun, with more on the way, despite some promises that the latest state of the nation address might provide a glimmer of hope.
While the popular focus remains, understandably, on the energy crisis, another critical blow came within 24 hours of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s Sona – the probable death knell for the SA Post Office. It was the confirmation that the long-mooted retrenchment of what was initially put as 6 000 postal workers was going ahead.
A similar process, with courier services, supermarkets and even petrol stations providing data receipt and delivery nodes, is already established locally, and growing. It was for this reason that what started as mail delivery services became publicly owned entities that adapted to the needs of citizens and technology. Such services, through the Post Office, are already severely curtailed, courtesy of an inept closure programme that saw offices closed without warning and even entire PO Box units disappearing the same way.
But the poor, while disorganised, remain largely voiceless. That this should be so in 2023 is an indictment of the labour movement, especially in January and February of this year, when the 50th anniversary of that watershed in South African history, the Durban Moment, was celebrated.
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