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Cape Town - Cosatu will declare a Nedlac-level dispute over Western Cape premier Helen Zille's male-dominated executive council, the trade union federation said on Monday.
Notice of the dispute would be filed on Wednesday, the Congress of SA Trade Unions (Cosatu) Western Cape secretary Tony Ehrenreich said after a meeting with Zille.
It would be done under section 77 of the Labour Relations Act, which covers worker protest on socio-economic issues.
"That gives us the right to force the premier into a discussion convened by Nedlac," Ehrenreich said.
"If there's no agreement and the due process has been followed, workers can go on a legally protected strike."
He said Zille had conceded at Monday's meeting that there was a problem with the lack of representivity of women in her executive.
"We have not been able to reach agreement on it because she insists on misleading the conversation on what happens with President Zuma's government and representivity issues there, instead of finding a solution here."
He said if Zille did not work with Cosatu at the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac) to find solutions, there was a "real possibility" of protest action in the Western Cape.
Zille could solve the problem by appointing female MPLs from the Congress of the People and the Independent Democrats, or by passing regulations that allowed her to bring in individuals from outside the legislature.
Ehrenreich said Cosatu believed representivity was an important component of building the inclusive society that the Constitution spoke of.
Monday's meeting was attended, he said, by leaders of Business Unity in the Western Cape, other members of the Cosatu provincial executive, Zille and key officials.
Zille's spokesperson Robert Macdonald said her office would wait to see Cosatu's section 77 submission before commenting on it.
"We'll take it as it comes," he said. "Our focus at the moment is on building stability, governance and finding ways to get the economy going."
He said Zille had had a "fairly long" discussion with the business and Cosatu representatives on the recession, and its impact on job creation and losses, and on business.
They had also discussed in some detail issues around her executive, and Zille had told Cosatu it should not look at the body in isolation.
In the DA-led City of Cape Town, she had said, there were significant numbers of women in leadership positions.
In addition many DA women had opted for deployment to parliament rather than the provinces.
- Sapa
