The report says members of a dozen unions gathered at UAW Local 551 on Jan. 7 for a spirited Rally in solidarity with trade unionists struggling for freedom and democracy in South Africa. The Rally was sponsored by Local 551's Civil Rights Committee and the Illinois Labor Network Against Apartheid. The report says South African trade union sister, Nomonde Ngubo, delivered a moving presentation. The report says Ngubo spoke about the Conference for a great Democratic Future held in S. A. in December 1989, in which over 2,000 organizations participated. The report says unions and anti-apartheid groups are lobbying the US. Congress to pass Comprehensive Sanctions against South Africa that would...
The report says members of a dozen unions gathered at UAW Local 551 on Jan. 7 for a spirited Rally in solidarity with trade unionists struggling for freedom and democracy in South Africa. The Rally was sponsored by Local 551's Civil Rights Committee and the Illinois Labor Network Against Apartheid. The report says South African trade union sister, Nomonde Ngubo, delivered a moving presentation. The report says Ngubo spoke about the Conference for a great Democratic Future held in S. A. in December 1989, in which over 2,000 organizations participated. The report says unions and anti-apartheid groups are lobbying the US. Congress to pass Comprehensive Sanctions against South Africa that would ban all trade, stop loans, oil and other resources that prop up S.A.'s regime. The report says stressing the role that Royal Dutch /Shell plays in supplying the S.A. military and police forces with fuel for "their vehicles of war," Ngubo said emphatically, "Support the Shell Boycott!" The report says apartheid is S.A.'s system of racial segregation that maintains white minority rule over the black majority through mass evictions, executions and police state tactics; it enforces a reign of terror against all those striving for freedom and democracy. The report says Nomonde Ngubo, a founding member of the National Union of Mineworkers, South Africa's largest union, and an International Rep. of the United Mine Workers of America, AFL-CIO, was the keynote Speaker. The report says the Solidarity Rally was chaired by UAW Local 551 President Darwin Greenley and Kathy Devine of the Labor Network. The report says rally speakers included Joe Naughton, UAW Local 588 President, Ronald P. Bowden, Sr. of AFSCME Local 2000, and Michael Elliott of UAW Local 551; Bowden and Elliott, representing the Labor Network, emphasized the importance of Comprehensive Mandatory Sanctions against S.A. and solidarity with trade union brothers and sisters in S.A. The report says Elliott noted why we support the unions and people of S. A. "When you see people, including small children, beaten, tortured .... people don't even have the right to vote in their own birthplace .... yet those courageous people in S. A. have organized the most democratic and effective labor movement in modern history." The report says Congressman Charles A. Hayes (1st D.) was invited to the podium by Sister Ngubo who spotted him in the audience; Hayes commented on parallels between racism and economics here and in S.A. The report says the Rally ended enthusiastically with a round of singing led by Ngubo and Allen Schwartz, President of AFSCME Local 3506. In closing, all in attendance locked hands in unity and sang "Solidarity Forever." The report says the Rally sent a clear message to unions in S.A. that we here do indeed support their courageous struggle and we call on all freedom loving people to join us by refusing to buy Shell gasoline and by demanding that the U.S. Congress enact Comprehensive Mandatory Sanctions against S.A. The report discusses reform, and F.W. de Klerk,
