http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=750957
Opposition to a shipment of arms being offloaded in Durban and transported to Zimbabwe increased today when South Africa’s largest transport workers union announced that its members would not unload the ship.
Zim-bound arms cargo was approved
SA Transport and Allied Workers Union (Satawu) general secretary Randall Howard said: "Satawu does not agree with the position of the South African government not to intervene with this shipment of weapons.
"Our members employed at Durban Container Terminal will not unload this cargo neither will any of our members in the truck driving sector move this cargo by road." He said the ship, the An Yue Jiang, should not dock in Durban and should return to China.
South Africa cannot be seen to be facilitating the flow of weapons into Zimbabwe at a time where there is a political dispute and a volatile situation between the Zanu-PF and the MDC."
"The view of our members is that nobody should ask us to unload these weapons," he said.
Satawu said it planned to engage support from the Congress of SA Trade Unions (Cosatu).
Defence secretary January Masilela told Sapa today that the scrutiny committee of the National Conventional Arms Control Committee’s (NCACC) scrutiny committee, which he chairs, had approved the conveyance permit on Monday already.
He said a inspection team from the NCACC would still have to ensure the cargo met the requirements of the permit before the cargo could begin to be transported to Zimbabwe. The permit would be endorsed by the NCACC when it meets next month.
Asked about the controversy surrounding the shipment Masilela said: "This is a normal transaction between two sovereign states. We are doing our legal part and we don’t have to interfere."
In Cape Town, government communications head Themba Maseko said the country could not stop the shipment from getting to its destination as it had to be seen to be "treading very carefully" in its relations with Zimbabwe, given the complexity of facilitating talks between the Movement for Democratic Change and Zanu-PF.
Chris de Vos, the secretary general for the United Transport and Allied Trade Union, said the union was "not happy" about the arms shipment being transported through South Africa.
"We are going to request an urgent meeting with the management. We are aware that members are very uncomfortable with the situation," he said.
He said that while no decision had been taken by the union on offloading the weapons and arms, the union leadership was not in favour of the weapons being transported.
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