ZCTU’s Dutch consultants deported

By Lance Guma
20 March 2006

Government continued its crackdown on the main labour union by deporting two visiting consultants from the Dutch trade union FNV. Bagani Ngeleza and Jeff Handmaker were on their way to evaluate a Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Union programme, which FNV is sponsoring. However immigration officials at Harare International Airport deported them without giving any reasons. ZCTU information officer Mlamleli Sibanda says they are embarrassed by the stance of the immigration department who have made sure all ZCTU visitors are deported.

Sibanda says government wants them to clear all their visitors with them but the ZCTU is refusing to give in to those demands. He says the trade union remains an autonomous body and will not allow the Ministry of Labour to run it as an extension of their department.

Last month Pat Horn from Street Net in South Africa was also denied entry into the country. Just like the FNV officials Horn travelled to Zimbabwe to attend the ZCTU labour school. She was forced to spend a night at the airport police station before catching a plane to Johannesburg the following morning. Street Net is an international federation of 20 street vendor organisations in 18 countries and has its head office in Durban, South Africa. Ms Horn was invited by Street Net’s affiliate, the Zimbabwe Chamber of Informal Economy Associations and the ZCTU to facilitate a session at the ZCTU Silver School of Labour.

Government paranoia over ZCTU visitors began last year in February when a 15-member delegation from the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) was barred from entering Zimbabwe. The group, led by COSATU secretary-general Zwelinzima Vavi and first deputy president Joe Nkosi, intended to conduct a fact-finding mission ahead of parliamentary elections in March that year. Immigration officials issued deportation orders, saying they were prohibited immigrants. This was after Labour Minister Paul Mangwana warned COSATU their presence would not be welcome.