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Cosatu seeks to revisit Zim
The Daily Mirror
January 14, 2005

http://www.dailymirror.co.zw/index.cfm?name=natnews&wh=main&sid=9747&ishudate=2005-01-14%2008:46:00.0&ishuid=331

Barely three months after its delegation was kicked out of the country, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) has confronted the Zimbabwean government again seeking permission to tour the southern African nation on a fact-finding mission. Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) secretary general Wellington Chibebe, yesterday confirmed receiving communication from Cosatu spelling out its plans to tour the country. Chibebe was quick to point out that the union’s mission had nothing to do with testing Zimbabwe’s political temperatures. "It’s not that they want to come and assess the political situation in the country, in fact it is a repeat of their earlier mission," he said. Chibebe, who was in South Africa last week, said the idea to visit Zimbabwe was reached by Cosatu’s supreme decision-making body, the congress. "They are fulfilling the congress’s decision," he said, adding that it was not yet known when the delegation would visit the country.

The Minister of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare Paul Mangwana yesterday confirmed receiving communication from Cosatu to that effect. Mangwana said: "I received a letter from Cosatu. I am not at liberty to engage in relations with entities of a foreign country directly. Cosatu should know that if they want to engage the government of Zimbabwe they have got to pass through their Labour Ministry in South Africa and that ministry would then get in touch with my ministry either directly or through the ministry of foreign affairs. That is how countries relate and engage each other."Mangwana warned that if the Cosatu delegation bulldozed its way into the country, it was going to meet the same fate as in October last year. "I do not know what they want in my country. I am having negotiations with ZCTU, a union in my country and our relations with ZCTU have improved. I am not interested in talking to them. They are a federation in South Africa and they have no business to do in my country, except through the bilateral-relations we have with the ministry of labour – South Africa," Mangwana said.

He added: "They are unwanted people. Unwanted people are thrown away. If they come we will force them into the next Kombi." A Cosatu delegation was bundled out of the country last year following protracted meetings with government officials, including security agents and officials from the Immigration Department after their visit was perceived to be political rather than union business. Home Affairs Minister Kembo Mohadi then said of the deportation: "Havana kudhipotwa, asi kuti vaenda kumusha kwavo. Ndiani akanga avabvumidza kupinda munyika muno? (They were not deported. They simply returned to their country. Who had allowed them into the country, anyway?") Efforts to get a comment from Cosatu were fruitless yesterday.

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