The Congress of South African Trade Unions congratulates every South African on the unbelievable success of the 2010 FIFA World Cup, this historic global event that was held on African soil for the first time. It has confounded the prophets of doom who believed that Africa could never run a FIFA World Cup Final and who kept predicting a disaster. In the end it proved to be the best-run World Cup ever, a brilliant organisational triumph, running smoothly all the way from the spectacular opening ceremony to Sunday’s extraordinary closing ceremony and final.

The whole world has seen the best possible picture of South Africa on their TV screens – beautiful stadiums packed with exuberant fans, a festive atmosphere in the streets and fan parks, efficient public transport, visible policing, minimal levels of crime, and an effective and efficient judicial system. Even the criminals appear to have gone on holiday – we urge them to remain wherever they are! We acknowledge that this success is also due to visible policing. In this regard we thank the Minister of Police, Nathi Mthethwa, and National Commissioner, Bheki Cele, for their strong leadership.

But it has been an even bigger psychological triumph for the country. It has instilled an unprecedented feeling of national pride and self-esteem. It has led to an explosion of patriotism that extended to the entire continent. This patriotism has been rubbed off on the young South Africans now and for many generations to come. It has brought us together as a nation as never before, except possibly for one day on 27 April 1994. South Africans - from all races, classes, and walks of life, including young children – have come together united in a common cause. Support for Bafana Bafana welded the nation together, and then, after their exit from the tournament, all South Africans united in support for Ghana, as the only remaining African team.

We wish to thank and congratulate the FIFA Local Organising Committee led by the chairperson Dr Irvin Khoza. We single out Dr Danny Jordaan for special praise as he drove the process on a full-time basis together with a team of dedicated and able staff. We also thank workers in general and the business fraternity, who all went beyond the call of duty and demonstrated that there is nothing impossible when a nation unites behind a single goal.

Again to say, it is not the generals that make history but ordinary soldiers, the masses who waved flags, sang a single uniting national anthem so passionately, filled the stadiums and fan parks and opened their hearts and homes to our visitors. South Africa demonstrated to all what it means to be an African and what ubuntu really means. Indeed this was a celebration of African humanity.

What lessons can we draw from this phenomenal success?

We now know we have a good government that led all the way from the time when the infrastructure was put in place up to the last moment. We now know that we have an efficient and effective police, traffic police and judicial system.  We have skilled and hard-working workers – including construction and security workers, stewards, administrators – and we have 18 000 enthusiastic volunteers whose skills and experience should not be lost. We thank them all.

We now know that South Africans love their country and can unite behind a single goal, irrespective of the things that used to divide us in the past. For four weeks we stood united behind the goal of hosting the World Cup and behind our national soccer team. For a month there was no racism, sexism, tribalism or regionalism but just proud South Africans. There could be no better 92nd birthday gift to our icon Nelson Mandela than this. He saw his dream unfolding in front of his own eyes.

The question we must ask now is how can our country build on this success and how can we ensure that we do not return to the past?

• How do we maintain the momentum of unity behind a single goal, with no racism, an effective police and judicial system?
• How can we use the momentum and self-confidence we have seen in these four weeks to achieve similar successes in other areas of our national life and transform the lives of our people in a manner that can deepen the unity we have seen?
• How can we harness the skills and expertise of the workers who built our new stadiums, roads and public transport infrastructure - efficiently and on schedule - to build the much needed schools, houses, clinics, roads, bridges and sewers in our poor communities?
• How can we put to good use the volunteers who went beyond the call of duty to help our visitors and made sure the matches proceeded without a hitch? 
• How can we use the implementation models and managerial skills of those who ensured the smooth running of the World Cup, its fan parks, ticket sales, park ‘n rides, volunteers, etc, to transform the efficiency and speed of service delivery in our communities?
• How can we develop South African soccer and other sports so that we can challenge for victory in future World Cups and other international events?
• How can we build on the manifestation of African unity in support of Ghana to combat the feared re-eruption of xenophobic violence against our fellow-Africans?

Inspired by this success and challenged by these questions, COSATU wishes to propose that all workers through their trade unions, the government, business, other civil society formations, all faith-based organisations and all the traditional leaders commit themselves to keep the current spirit and momentum and unite South Africa behind agreed-to national goals. In the coming period we shall be approaching all to commit to a set of goals as outlined below:

Declaration of commitment to maintaining the current levels of unity and confronting South African challenges post-2010 FIFA World Cup

We declare that South Africa can never be the same again! We want to live in a South Africa that we have seen in the past four weeks. We will strive to ensure that South Africa continues the wave of unity and uses the energy unleashed by the World Cup to build a lasting legacy for all South Africans and the African continent. In the coming period starting with the celebrations of our icon’s 92nd birthday we shall spare no energy to ensure:

1. Our nation remains united behind Bafana Bafana and does everything possible to promote soccer, which remains the biggest and most popular sport, yet is seriously under-developed. We are disturbed about media reports of pending leadership battles within the football family. We urge the football authorities to remain united, around only one goal - the development of soccer at every level. We urge government, in particular the departments of sports and education, to ensure that soccer and all other sporting codes are developed from our schools.
   
   There must be no dithering; SAFA must use all the money they are to receive from FIFA on development, and for nothing else. We need to discover the hidden talents of the hundreds of unknown South African Peles, Drogbas, Messis, Xavis and Ronaldos, who have no opportunity for their skills to be recognised. We need to develop academies to hone the skills of these promising players. We urge former white schools to develop soccer.  On 21 August 2010 we urge South African to once more come out in full support of our Amabhokobhoko when they play against New Zealand at Soccer City. We shall support all national sporting codes including our bid to host the Olympics in 2020. Sport has proven that it can play a key role in uniting our country and healing the wounds of the past.
   
2. We know that the ever-existing threat to our progress is the astronomical levels of unemployment, poverty and inequality which blight our land. Even as we prepared for and hosted the World Cup, jobs continued to disappear, inequalities continued to grow and poverty remains widespread. We need a new economic growth and development path that will help address these challenges with the necessary urgency and speed. We need to ensure an effective implementation of the IPAP2 to ensure industrialisation and restructuring of our sectors to preserve existing jobs and to create new jobs.
   
3. We commit to address the challenges of our education system. The 1-Goal Campaign and the Nelson Mandela Day celebrations offer an opportunity to take our international icon’s dream to new heights. We call on government to prioritise building and refurbishing schools and to ensure that all schools receive adequate support from the education departments at all levels. We call on South Africans to make every school function, so that we can return to the culture of learning and produce workers with the skills the nation requires. Education must move beyond the call for all to donate books and build school libraries on the Nelson Mandela Day. The campaign must run for the next 12 months until every school functions and is a centre of empowerment to build a new generation that can take our dreams forward. 
   
4. We commit to the transforming our health system and implementing the National Health Insurance Scheme. We have to fix our public hospitals and defeat the scourge of HIV/AIDS to build a healthy nation and improve our country’s life expectancy.
   
5. We commit to address underdevelopment and poverty in rural areas. This campaign should address food insecurity and empower our people to use land that currently lies unused, so that people can produce the food they need and escape from their deep levels of unemployment and poverty.
   
6. We commit to campaign against crime and corruption. We can build on the successes of the World Cup by sending out an unequivocal message that crime does not pay. Corruption is stealing from the poor to feed into narrow elites’ selfish accumulation interests. Corruption kills the spirits of the majority, black and white, who want to work hard to build their country. We will act decisively against corruption including misuse of state power and resources for narrow factional interests irrespective of who is involved.
   
7. We commit to work hard to fix the energy challenge the country is facing. We need more action and not empty words to ensure that South Africa moves out of the current energy crisis.
   
8. We commit to spare no energy in finding solutions to the looming water shortage crisis so that we do not wait for 2025 when the problem will be much more intense.
   
9. We do recognise that many public servants work hard and serve our people with integrity. But there is a minority that regrettably continues with work ethics that demonstrate a careless attitude and in some instances contempt for our people including the elderly. For change to happen it requires that we do more to ensure that the public service adopts a new culture of service to our people. We commit ourselves to support the ongoing endeavours of the trade union movement to campaign to change work ethics in the public service so that they can be people-service oriented.
   
10. We recognise that South Africa will not succeed to develop unless development also takes place in our SADC region and in the entire continent. Everything possible must be done to prevent a new outbreak of xenophobic attacks in some of our poorest communities. No matter how bad living conditions are, there can be no excuse for blaming fellow-Africans for the country’s and continent’s economic failures. It would be a tragedy, after the display of African unity in support of the Ghana football team, to see foreigners being made scapegoats for the lack of service delivery in our communities. They are not the cause but the fellow victims of our unjust and unequal economic system. Workers and the poor must stand united against the common enemies of capitalist greed and corruption.
    
11. Lastly and most importantly we demand more decisive and visionary leadership. The period of own goals and foot-in-the-mouth must belong to the past. This newfound spirit of unity and racial harmony will not succeed unless strong leadership helps to maintain the mood moving forward. Leadership must at all times, irrespective of whether there are visitors or not, act in an exemplary fashion. We need leadership at all levels within and outside government, in every political and civil society formation to act with integrity and honesty. That is the only way we can inspire confidence in our political system and democracy.

We call on the government and all our country’s political formations together with other organs of people’s power to unite behind realisation of these new goals.

Patrick Craven
National Spokesperson
Congress of South African Trade Unions
1-5 Leyds Cnr Biccard Streets
Braamfontein, 2017 
P.O. Box 1019
Johannesburg, 2000
South Africa 
Tel: +27 11 339-4911/24
Fax: +27 11 339-5080/6940/ 086 603 9667
Cell: 0828217456
E-Mail: patrick@cosatu.org.za  

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