
INTRODUCING: UNITED DOMESTIC WORKERS OF SOUTH AFRICA
1
12
0

I have known Pinky Mashiane for a couple of years now. She is one of the most inspiring people that I have met in my various missions to document the change makers of South Africa.
I wrote about her in the Daily Maverick for my project The Actionists and she was the first person that I reached out to when I decided to move Positive Activism in this new direction.
I have never met anyone who is as certain about their own personal direction, and as motivated to work for the rights of others.
In fact Pinky's origin story demonstrates her character perfectly. Here is an extract from the Daily Maverick article ...
Walking through a wealthy suburb of Pretoria, Pinky saw a gardener being shouted at and threatened by his employer. Without thinking twice she marched through the gate, announced that she was from the Department of Labour and declared that she would have to report the employer for what she had just witnessed.
She didn’t work for the Department of Labour, and she had no means to report the man for his abusive behaviour, but he believed her story, and tried to bribe her to not report him. Pinky refused the money and insisted that he give it to the gardener, along with an apology. She took both their numbers so that she could check that the mistreatment never happened again.
It was at this point that she realised that she had the power to change people’s lives for the better.

The work that Pinky does through her organisation UDWOSA (United Domestic Workers of South Africa) is aligned to her character. She is a fierce defender of the rights of her contemporaries and she spends every waking hour fighting for justice in it's various forms.
Domestic Workers are some of the most poorly treated people in South Africa because their job is mostly informal and unregulated. The desperation for work often leads people to accept conditions and treatment that border on human rights violations, putting up with it so as to keep food on the table.
The UDWOSA help domestic workers and gardeners with all sorts of different issues from sexual harassment to unfair deductions for breakages. They support the enforcement of a minimum wage and help with mediation between employers and their employees. Very often they attend court cases where their clients are claiming compensation for injuries, abuse and non payment; to offer support and advice when their clients need it the most.

A good example of their work is illustrated through the story of Sarah Makuwa:
Sarah was working for a family in Pretoria in 2012 when she was blinded in one eye by an open bottle of drain cleaner that fell from the top shelf. Her employer had asked her to move all of the cleaning products to a lower shelf.
Instead of taking her straight to hospital, Sarah was made to wait until the husband got home and was driven to hospital two hours after the accident took place.
She stayed in hospital for 3 months, but when the family was asked to pay for medication they refused, saying that they didn’t have any money.
On returning to work she found that the electricity had been cut off to her living quarters, and the toilet had been blocked. After three months she was forced to leave and told that they could no longer employ her.
10 years later and Sarah still hasn’t received any compensation, but she is working with Pinky to get justice for her injury.

Spending time with Pinky, you realise that her phone doesn't stop ringing, so much is the demand for her and her organisation.