The Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (POPCRU) extends its full solidarity and support to the South African Municipal Workers’ Union (SAMWU) as it embarks on its National Day of Action on 09 July 2026 in Tshwane.
POPCRU views this action as an important expression of working-class resistance against the continued deterioration of municipalities, the undermining of workers’ rights, poor governance, corruption, outsourcing, austerity, and the systematic weakening of public services.
Municipal workers are at the coalface of service delivery. They are responsible for water, sanitation, refuse removal, electricity support services, roads, parks, cemeteries, community facilities and many other basic services that sustain the daily lives of working-class communities. When municipalities collapse, it is municipal workers who are blamed first, even when the real causes are political instability, poor planning, corruption, underfunding, outsourcing and the looting of public resources.
POPCRU therefore supports SAMWU’s call for urgent intervention in the state of local government. The crisis in municipalities is not only a municipal workers’ issue; it is a national working-class issue. Communities cannot receive quality services when workers are underpaid, under-resourced, victimised, casualised or forced to work under unsafe and unstable conditions.
As workers within the Criminal Justice Cluster, POPCRU members understand the consequences of a failing state at local level. Poor street lighting, broken roads, water shortages, unmanaged waste, unsafe public spaces and collapsing community infrastructure all contribute to social instability, crime, poor health and deepening community frustration. These conditions also place additional pressure on police officers, correctional officials, traffic officers and other public servants who are expected to respond to problems created by systemic governance failures.
POPCRU further believes that the defence of municipal workers is inseparable from the defence of public services. The working class cannot allow municipalities to be reduced into playgrounds for tender networks, private profiteers and factional interests. Local government must be rebuilt as a sphere of democratic accountability, public service delivery, decent work, ethical leadership and community participation.
We therefore call on government to listen to SAMWU’s demands with seriousness and urgency. Workers cannot be expected to carry the burden of municipal collapse while those responsible for mismanagement and corruption remain unaccountable.
POPCRU calls for:
• The protection of municipal workers’ rights and conditions of service.
• An end to outsourcing, casualisation and the privatisation of basic municipal services.
• Urgent intervention in dysfunctional municipalities.
• Proper funding of local government to enable effective service delivery.
• Accountability for corruption, maladministration and political interference.
• Safe working conditions for municipal workers.
• The filling of critical vacancies across municipalities.
• The strengthening of collective bargaining and respect for organised labour.
POPCRU stands with SAMWU because the struggles of municipal workers are connected to the struggles of all public servants and working-class communities. An injury to municipal workers is an injury to the entire working class.
We call on all progressive forces, communities and workers to support SAMWU’s National Day of Action and to defend the principle that public services must serve the people, not private profit.
Issued by POPCRU
For more information contact Richard Mamabolo on 066 135 4349
Source: https://cosatu.org.za/popcru-supports-samwus-national-day-of-action/