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Johannesburg - The ongoing strike in the platinum mining sector was raised during a number of May Day speeches, including by President Jacob Zuma in Polokwane.
"Unions must be alive to the realities that endless strikes are not in the interest of the workers and not in the interest of the economy," he told thousands of people at Cosatu's Workers' Day rally on Thursday.
Zuma said that the business sector needed to respect workers' rights and pay decent wages.
"I think we should all agree that the time has come for the situation on the mines to change."
Earlier the crowd at Peter Mokaba Stadium, a sea of yellow ANC T-shirts and red trade union shirts, chanted "Zuma, Zuma, Zuma" as the president walked a lap around the stadium.
An Amcu-led strike at the country's platinum mines, involving about 70 000 workers, has been going on for three months. The Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union is a rival union to the ANC-affiliated National Union of Mineworkers (NUM).
In eMalahleni, Mpumalanga, Amcu president Joseph Mathunjwa told the crowd, wearing yellow Nactu T-shirts handed out for free and green Amcu ones, that unions which were political bedfellows with the ANC would not help workers.
United Democratic Movement leader Bantu Holomisa, the first speaker at the same National Council of Trade Unions -organised event, reiterated his support for the platinum miners' strike action.
The strike was also mentioned at Cosatu's rally in Rustenburg, North West. NUM deputy president Thamsanqa Matosa called on strikers to go back to work.
"This is not a labour dispute; it is a strike intended to destroy the economy of our country," he told the crowd.
Speaking at the Polokwane rally, Congress of SA Trade Unions' president Sidumo Dlamini stressed the union federation's support for Zuma and the ANC.
"President Jacob Zuma is our leader, we respect you in Cosatu."
At the same event, SA Communist Party general secretary Blade Nzimande lambasted opposition parties.
"On the May 7 [elections] let us teach the opposition a lesson."
Referring to Julius Malema's Economic Freedom Fighters, he called on ANC voters to teach a lesson to the "tenderpreneurs who have stolen our colours". A tenderpreneur is a politician who seeks self-enrichment by trying to get government contracts.
Malema's party also got a tongue lashing from SACP deputy general secretary Jeremy Cronin who called them "loud-mouth demagogues".
Cronin, speaking in Daveyton, on the East Rand, said the EFF had "never done an honest day's work in their life, so where do they get their fancy cars, their fancy watches, their fancy shoes?"
At Nactu's Mpumalanga rally, EFF leader Julius Malema called on his supporters to teach the ANC a lesson by voting for his party.
In Kimberley, Northern Cape, Democratic Alliance leaders told their supporters they hoped to turn the province blue, the DA's colour.
Party leader Helen Zille said: "Every blue person must come out and vote. Keep to the blue, because blue stays true."
ANC treasurer general Zweli Mkhize told a May Day rally in Khayelitsha, Cape Town, that the DA was "more of a PR company [that has] no substance".
