NUM Welcomes ‘One of Its Own’ as Acting President of South Africa

ICEM South African affiliate National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) was joyous with the news that the country’s Parliament elected Kgalema Motlanthe as President of the country two weeks ago. Motlanthe, a former NUM staffer and General Secretary, was sworn in on 25 September, replacing Thabo Mbeki who resigned.

He will serve as South Africa’s third president in post-apartheid era until at least next year’s elections.

South African President Kgalema Motlanthe

Considered a master educational strategist and a voice of reason within the now tumultuous landscape of the African National Congress (ANC), Motlanthe stepped into a prominent NUM role in 1987 immediately after serving a 10-year prison sentence for activities within the then-outlawed ANC. He became the union’s Education Secretary then, and was the prime architect in shaping the union’s strong shop steward system.

In January 1992, he was elected by the NUM’s Central Committee to succeed General Secretary Cyril Ramaphosa when Ramaphosa was elected Secretary-General of the ANC. In 1997, he again succeeded the great Ramaphosa at the helm of the ANC, a position held now by former ICEM Executive Committee member and NUM General Secretary Gwede Mantashe. Motlanthe, now 59, was elected Deputy President of the ANC late last year after Jacob Zuma defeated Mbeki as leader of the ANC.

Motlanthe’s tenure at the NUM – besides building lasting rank-and-file political education programmes – included negotiating two-year bargaining periods opposite the Chamber of Mines, negotiation terms still intact today. He also pioneered trade union investment mechanisms and was a leading and early proponent on laws vesting mineral rights with the state.

At age 23 in 1972, Motlanthe when to Mozambique where he joined the banned ANC. He was arrested for 11 months in 1976 for his efforts to organise students, and then a year later began his 10-year prison term at Robben Island, where he was imprisoned with anti-apartheid stalwarts Nelson Mandela, Harry Gwala, Mac Muharaj, and Walter Sisulu, who became his mentor inside the famed lock-up.

At the NUM’s Congress in 2004, speaking during his second term as ANC Secretary-General, Motlanthe urged delegates to “use the union’s structure to enhance the struggles” to deal with poverty and to transform a society that defends the rights of workers in order to overcome an economic divide.