SOUTH AFRICA

Unpaid Benefits Campaign media statement on the Constitutional Court’s decision to dismiss Rosemary Hunter’s application

The Constitutional Court today closed the door on the skeletons that the Financial Services Board has been trying to hide in its judgement on Rosemary Hunter’s application for the cancellations by the FSB of 4,600 funds to be investigated. The pillaging of potentially hundreds of millions of rands of workers’ savings in provident and pension funds that are unpaid will remain hidden for now. wwmp.org.za/

Cosatu bleeds members

Cosatu has lost more than 300,000 members in the past three years and its affiliates are defying the organisation’s leadership in the face of deep internal fights over money for subscription. Its political and organisational reports show the federation’s membership continued to decline after the expulsion of Numsa. iol.co.za

‘I take responsibility for some of COSATU’s troubles’

Outgoing COSATU president S’dumo Dlamini has blamed greed on the part of union leaders for the federation’s massive loss of membership. groups.google.com/…yclsa-eom-forum/

Constitutional Court rules to protect workers hired by labour brokers

The Constitutional Court settled a long running controversy over the employment status of workers employed by “labour brokers”. This settled a Labour Court interpretation of the law as allowing for dual employment. groundup.org.za/

Important victory for smaller trade unions

In an important victory for smaller unions, the Constitutional Court has ruled that a minority union can organise in the workplace even if it doesn’t meet membership requirements agreed on by the majority union and the employer. This ruling will give minority unions organisational rights in industries where established unions have thrown their weight about. groundup.org.za/

Adam Hanieh on SAfm: Where to with liberation struggles in the Middle East?

Workers on Wednesday took a break from local labour issues and featured special guest Dr Adam Hanieh, a lecturer in Political Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London. He is in the country to deliver the Abdulhay Ahmed Saloojee memorial lecture in which he spoke about liberation struggles in the Middle East. wwmp.org.za/

INTERNATIONAL

Hold the front page. The reporters are missing

Although journalism was always a loose extension of establishment power, something has changed in recent years. Dissent tolerated when I joined a national newspaper in Britain in the 1960s has regressed to a metaphoric underground as liberal capitalism moves towards a form of corporate dictatorship. This is a seismic shift, with journalists policing the new “groupthink”, as Parry called it, dispensing its myths and distractions, pursuing its enemies. johnpilger.com/

Yemen’s Descent Into Hell: a Saudi-American War of Terror

Ever since President Donald Trump (like Barack Obama before him) embraced the Saudi-led coalition as this country’s righteous knight errant in the Middle East, the fight against impoverished Yemen’s Houthi rebels — who have, in turn, been typecast as Iran’s cats-paw — has only grown fiercer. Meanwhile, the al-Qaeda affiliate there continues to expand. counterpunch.org/

Obama’s Imperial Presidency

One article of faith among liberals and the corporate media is that Trump’s presidency stands alone as a house or horrors, unprecedented in its fascistic authoritarianism, crazy pronouncements, and ideological blend of xenophobia, racism, sexism, and sheer extremism. Obama, it turns out, was among the most militaristic White House occupants in American history, taking the imperial presidency to new heights. counterpunch.org/

Selling Out is Not a Sacrifice

I, like many others, fully supported Kaepernick’s silent, symbolic protest against American racism and policy brutality through his “taking a knee” during the national anthem at football games, I also sympathized with his career sacrifice to stand for his beliefs. Now, I find myself seemingly stranded on a desert island in my denunciation of his disappointing turn. There is nothing heroic in endorsing a multinational corporation. counterpunch.org/

#MeToo: McDonald’s Workers Strike to End Sexual Harassment: Philippine Pres. Duterte’s War on the Workers

This Building Bridges podcast discusses McDonald’s workers who have voted to stage a one-day strike at restaurants in 10 cities to pressure management to take stronger steps against sexual harassment in the workplace. Elmer Labog, Chairperson of a Filipino labour federation, also shares the repression of unions by the Duterte regime. Thirty.labour leaders have been killed since Duterte became president. archive.org/

Amid poll restrictions, Eswatini activists hope for change

The country formerly known as Swaziland set to hold elections but democracy activists question fairness of poll system. With a wide range of powers allowing the king to summon and dissolve parliament or declare a state of emergency, Eswatini, home to some 1.4 million people, is ranked among the world’s last remaining absolute monarchies. aljazeera.com/

Private schools in Rwanda close down as public schools become more attractive to parents

Private schools in Rwanda are on the verge of closing down due to low patronage. Desperate proprietors who face closure of their institutions are now asking the government to sponsor students in private schools at public rates. newspeakonline.com/

ISRAEL / PALESTINE

Ireland officially approves ban on Israeli products

Ireland’s senate has voted in favour of a bill banning the importation of products from occupied Palestinian territories, paving the way for the country to become the first EU nation to enforce a boycott. Israel’s foreign ministry, which is headed by the extremist Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, had summoned Ireland’s ambassador to Israel, Alison Kelly. daysofpalestine.com/

Ashrawi condemns ‘Israel’s murder of 6 Palestinians within 24 hours’

PLO Executive Committee Member Dr Hanan Ashrawi called on the International Criminal Court in The Hague “to take immediate action and open an official and criminal investigation into such widespread and flagrant war crimes and crimes against humanity being committed throughout occupied Palestine.” maannews.com/

Israel bars EU Parliament delegation from entering Gaza

Asserting that Israel had tried to prevent the delegation from seeing Gaza’s dire humanitarian situation, the delegation chairperson said it was clear that the self-proclaimed Jewish state was “ashamed and afraid” to allow the delegation into the besieged coastal enclave. middleeastmonitor.com/

Decoding the Pipes/Trump/Kushner ‘Deal of the Century”

Trump’s “Deal of the Century” is a bullying ploy intended to coerce the Palestinians into surrendering their internationally recognized rights. foreignpolicyjournal.com/

NEW TECHNOLOGIES / NEW FORMS OF LABOUR

Are Bosses Dictators?

Elizabeth Anderson writes, in “Private Government: How Employers Rule Our Lives (And Why We Don’t Talk About It)” that work for millions of Americans is done under authoritarian managerial regimes. Anderson reports that audits by the Department of Labor have found “sweatshop-like conditions” in ninety-three per cent of the garment factories in Southern California. newyorker.com/

Legal and Safety Issues Are Looming Around Ethics, AI, and Robots

As artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms continue to advance, making sure that the AI entities can explain their decision-making process will be extremely important, especially after an accident that results in injury or death. roboticsbusinessreview.com/

FILM & LITERATURE

Sorry, Not Sorry

Raymond “Boots” Riley, director of the new film Sorry to Bother You, called himself a revolutionary when it was politically incorrect. For three decades he has read, written, spoken, worked, organized, studied, taught, directed, acted, organized, partied, parented, made music—and organized some more. One cannot understand the film without appreciating his background. bostonreview.net/

Review of Radical Sacrifice by Terry Eagleton

This volume represents another example of the quasi-religious phase of the ‘later Eagleton’. The author has effectively come full circle in his intellectual evolution. Eagleton has creatively sought to synthesise the leftist Catholicism with which he first emerged as a critical force in the 1960s, with the sober and yet stubbornly optimistic brand of Marxism he has clung onto in recent decades. marxandphilosophy.org.uk/

THEORY

Set Theory of the Left

“Intersectionality”—This term is typically advanced as a positive value. It is supposed to describe the way various political constituencies intersect at points of common interest. There seems to be some promise of inclusion, unity, and strength implied when one invokes the presence of intersectionality. Is it so virtuous as all that? Are the identitarians, for that matter? counterpunch.org/