By Own Correspondent

THE Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) has hailed the role played by the Organisation of African Trade Union Unity (OATUU) in promoting the continent’s trade unions for the last 50 years.

In its remarks delivered by  the 1^st deputy secretary general Runesu Dzimiri to mark the continental organ’s 50^th anniversary celebrations recently in Ghana, ZCTU acknowledged the special invitation by the OATUU to attend this 50^th Anniversary celebrations.

The ZCTU said the golden jubilee marks the organ’s opportunity to progress beyond 50 years.

“We in Zimbabwe acknowledge the role of OATUU as an independent Pan-African federation of trade unions aimed at unifying trade union centres in Africa. We are satisfied with the work that OATUU has been doing since its inception in 1973 as a successor to two previously competing labour union organisations in Africa namely the All-African Trade Union Federation (AATUF) and the African Trade Union Confederation (ATUC),” said ZCTU.

He said over the years, OATUU has been a driving force in uniting trade unions in Africa as well as advancing Pan-Africanism, economic justice, and social justice throughout African workplaces.

The ZCTU said it is also gratifying that OATUU has remained steadfast in ensuring that the vision of Pan Africanists like Tom Mboya and Kwame Nkrumah of promoting Pan-Africanism and being an independent federation of labour unions that prioritized the interests of all African workers throughout the continent are kept alive.

The ZCTU official called for the implementation of Decent Work policies that are now an indispensable tool to advance the worker’s struggle across the African continent.

“Africa is currently faced by employment challenges where we find most of our members jobless and in the informal sector. One of the strategies employed by the ZCTU in response to employment challenges has been to organize the informal economy workers. This was born out of the realization that as a trade union we were losing membership to the informal economy through retrenchments and company closures. The trade union has taken the lead in calling for the government to nurture the informal economy and put in place policies that ensure the informal economy realizes its full potential or to integrate the non-formal sectors through empowerment measures,” said ZCTU.