Pic: ANCWL Secretary, Ms Meokgo Matuba
By Staff Reporter
14 April 2016
The African National Congress Women’s League (ANCWL) Secretary, Ms Meokgo Matuba said the ANCWL will submit to the ANC that the time is now to provide the Post Bank a full license to operate and move all the Government and State Owned Enterprises’ bank accounts to Post Bank.
She said the League will support a push by the ANC or any of its Alliance partner for a new financial sector architecture that will results in having financial institutions that will serve the interests of the people of SA, specifically women.
“It is only through the united ANC that we can fight any form of onslaught towards us and our children,” she said.
This is after some financial institution cancelled their banking facilities with Oakbay Investment (PTY) Ltd. The ANCWL said decisions taken by a number of financial institutions regarding Oakbay Investments is an onslaught on South African women and children.
The ANCWL called all its members who are working in these financial institutions to join COSATU affiliated unions in the sector and work through their labour unions to engage COSATU and propose a total shut down of these institutions whose aim, it said, is to attack the working class using their imperialism muscles.
“These attack affect South African women and children who are in the main beneficiaries of the working class destitute, we will work through the ANC and support any action towards these institutions to be taken by ANC or any of its Alliance partners,” she said.
The Women’s league said most of the SA financial institutions are foreign owned and are mostly biased towards their imperialists’ masters than serving the people of South Africa.
The League said it is raising these issues based on ANCWL’s interests on the livelihood of the dependents of the workers in this Oakbay Company who are in the main unemployed women and children.
“We believe that the victims of the collusion strategy taken by these financial institutions are in majority the unemployed SA women and children who are the dependents of employees of Oakbay Investments (PTY) Ltd. Therefore the ANCWL will stand by and watch the financial monopolies waging cold-war against SA women and children.
She said whilst the League has forgiven FNB in 2013, they have not yet forgotten that FNB orchestrated an attack on the ANC and Government as well as acting in a “treasonous” manner by posting online videos that fed into the opposition narrative that seeks to project the ANC and its Government in a negative manner. “Instead of calling for people and Government to close their accounts with FNB, the ANC decided to accept the apology from the bank,” she said.
“Now the same bank which has Johan Rupert as its shareholder through “Remgro” is part of the strategic indirect onslaught to the workers who have dependents to provide for. The banks continue to follow their imperialist masters in colluding and dislodging other companies. They continue to disregard the casualties of their actions as they can’t identify with the struggles of the workers,” Ms Matuba said.
She said in a country such as South Africa, with high unemployment rates which severely affects women and children, “the main objective of this cold-war which is initiated by financial institutions is to increase the levels of poverty and unemployment in SA which is characterized by race and gender factors. “The consequences of this cold war controlled by the masters in foreign countries will be job losses and in the main the African women and children will be the mostly affected,” she said.