Banning the Right to Strike? The Slippery Slope of Suppressing Worker Power in Africa
South Africa’s port and rail workers on strike. Source - The Millitant
Introduction: South Africa's Port Worker Ban – A Sign of What’s to Come?
In April 2025, South Africa’s Department of Employment and Labour proposed a new regulation that would effectively ban strikes among port workers, classifying their labour as an “essential service.” If implemented, this regulation would criminalise strike action by thousands of Transnet employees whose work underpins the country’s economy.
At first glance, this may seem like a narrowly targeted move, aimed at ensuring supply chain continuity and shielding ports from disruption. But for unions and labour movements across Africa, this marks a dangerous precedent, one that could ripple far beyond South Africa’s shores.
This article explores the broader implications of banning strikes on the continent, using South Africa as a springboard, while examining the power dynamics, union responses, and the deeper political economy behind strike suppression in Africa.
The Strike: A Last Resort, Not a First Option
Strikes are often portrayed by governments and media as acts of disruption or economic sabotage. Yet, they are more accurately expressions of desperation, the final tool workers turn to when dialogue breaks down.
In South Africa, workers at Transnet, the state-owned logistics company, have staged strikes over pay, safety, and deteriorating working conditions. These are not unreasonable demands. Port workers perform back-breaking labour under high-risk conditions, often for stagnant wages and under chronic understaffing. To ban their right to strike is to deprive them of agency, leaving them vulnerable to exploitation with no recourse.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU); South Africa’s largest and most influential trade union federation, known for its historic role in the anti-apartheid struggle and its alliance with the ruling African National Congress (ANC), has joined forces with the South African Transport and Allied Workers Union (SATAWU), a key COSATU affiliate representing workers in sectors like freight, rail, ports, and aviation, to criticise the move.
Both unions warn that redefining more sectors as “essential” effectively curtails the right to strike, allowing the state to suppress labour action under the pretext of economic stability. They argue this strategy risks undermining hard-won labour freedoms and weakens workers' bargaining power at a time when inequality and precarious work are on the rise.
Africa-Wide Trend: Criminalising Worker Dissent
South Africa is not alone. Across Africa, governments are increasingly seeking to curb strike action through legal and administrative restrictions.
In Kenya, the Ministry of Labour has threatened striking doctors with termination, despite constitutional protections for industrial action. Teachers and lecturers, through unions like KNUT and UASU, have been forced back to work via court injunctions.
In Zimbabwe, the government has used security laws to arrest nurses and teachers for participating in peaceful protests. The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) has long condemned such moves as attempts to dismantle worker power under authoritarian rule.
Meanwhile, in Nigeria, a recent attempt by the government to classify fuel distribution workers as part of “essential services” drew sharp backlash from the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC). Their stance was clear: “Essential services” cannot be used as an excuse to strip essential rights.
This growing pattern reflects a structural conflict between neoliberal economic governance and labour rights, one where governments prioritise investor confidence and uninterrupted service delivery over worker dignity and collective bargaining.
Who Benefits When Strikes Are Banned?
The banning of strikes is rarely neutral. It typically serves the interests of powerful economic elites, both domestic and international.
In the case of South Africa’s port regulation, private shipping companies and exporters have long complained of delays and losses during strike periods. Their lobbying has fed narratives that port strikes “hurt the economy,” obscuring the fact that labour unrest is a symptom, not the disease.
Similarly, in oil-producing states like Nigeria or Angola, bans on strikes in “strategic sectors” disproportionately protect foreign extractive corporations whose profits rely on uninterrupted exploitation of local labour and resources.
In other words, banning strikes is not just about order; it’s about power. It is about tipping the scales in favour of capital, at the expense of workers.
Strikes Are a Pillar of Democracy
Africa’s liberation movements; from South Africa’s anti-apartheid struggle to Ghana’s independence push depended on worker mobilisation, mass boycotts, and industrial actions.
To now criminalise strikes is to undermine democratic values. The right to withhold labour is foundational to labour organising. Without it, collective bargaining loses teeth, and employers gain unchecked control.
Zingiswa Losi, President of COSATU and one of the continent’s most influential labour leaders, has noted that history teaches us when workers are silenced, injustice spreads unchecked, and that the right to strike is not negotiable.
Banning strikes also undermines the role of trade unions; already under pressure from casualisation, outsourcing, and digital platforms. Weakening their legal power leaves workers in a precarious position, especially in sectors already marginalised.
The Way Forward: Dialogue, Not Decree
Rather than outlawing strikes, African governments must address the underlying grievances that lead to them:
Understaffing, wage delays, unsafe conditions, and corruption remain endemic in many sectors.
Investment in social dialogue platforms, tripartite agreements, and workplace democracy must be prioritised.
The ILO’s Convention No. 87 (Freedom of Association) and Convention No. 98 (Collective Bargaining) should be upheld and respected across Africa, not just ratified on paper.
Regional labour bodies, such as the Organisation of African Trade Union Unity (OATUU), must speak out more forcefully against the creeping criminalisation of strikes. The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) and global federations also have a role to play in protecting African unions under threat.
Conclusion: From Economic Stability to Labour Justice
There is no economic stability without labour justice. If African governments are serious about inclusive development, they must protect, not punish, those who keep the wheels of the economy turning.
The move to ban strikes in South Africa’s ports is not just a national issue, it is a continental warning. It is a reminder that the erosion of rights begins with one regulation, one sector, one silenced worker.
Now is the time to resist that erosion. Because when the right to strike is taken away, so is the right to demand a better future.
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