SOUTH AFRICA: State workers and automobile manufacturing workers launch strikes in protest over pay and conditions

Record ID: 340024

  • Title: SOUTH AFRICA: State workers and automobile manufacturing workers launch strikes in protest over pay and conditions
  • Date: 19th August 2010
  • Summary: EMERGENCY VEHICLE ENTERING HOSPITAL PREMISES
  • Embargoed: 3rd September 2010 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: South Africa
  • Country: South Africa
  • Topics: Employment,Domestic Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA2BAFAUF8SE6U53T7WEJG9QTDU
  • Story Text: Hundreds of South African health workers downed tools on Wednesday (August 18) and protested outside Natalspruit Hospital in Katlehong east of Johannesburg as part of a nationwide stoppage by more than one million public servants.
    Only a skeleton healthcare staff attended to patients as the majority joined the strike which threatens to cripple the countries essential services. Those going on strike include police, healthcare workers, teachers and customs officials.
    Public servants are demanding an 8.5-percent pay rise, double the inflation rate, and R1000 housing allowance. The government is offering 7-percent and R700 housing allowance.
    Maurice Mabusela from the National Healthcare Workers Union said the government is failing the people. "What we are saying is that the government has actually failed to meet the demands of the workers. Basically that is what I can say and I cannot say more than that and for that reason that that is the reason why people actually went out for strike," he said.
    The strike increases pressure on President Jacob Zuma's ruling African National Congress to reach a deal with organised labour and appease the party's longstanding union allies who also have been a reliable source of votes.
    But pressure will also mount on unions to reach a deal, with labour sources some of the groups in the labour coalition looking favourably on the government's offer and could sign a deal if the housing allowance was increased.
    Public opinion could turn against the unions if a prolonged work stoppage sends parents scrambling to find day care for their children, delays treatment at hospitals and slows paperwork across the board at government agencies.
    A mid-range civil servant already makes about 40 percent more in wages and benefits than the average South African worker who takes home 6,383 rand (880 U.S. dollars) a month.
    Essential services are expected to be maintained through skeleton staffing.
    In a further dispute thousands of automobile manufacturing employees took to the streets of Pretoria to demand a higher salary increase and the banning of labour brokers.
    "The demands is 15-percent increase across the board, that workers should be paid during short time, that the industry should outlaw labour brokers because we think that goes against the question of decent work," Karl Cloete, deputy secretary-general of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), told Reuters Television.
    In a statement, the union said that it was conscious that the automotive industry was the leading manufacturing sector in the economy of the country with the largest gross domestic product (GDP) contribution. It was further the strategic pillar of of the economy, the statement said, but added that the employers oligarchy was losing close to R12,5 million a day and production had collapsed in all the plants as a result of the workers' actions. The union added that employers are in a position to meet their demands but are refusing to do so.
    The Automobile Manufacturers Employers Association (AMEO) says the workers' demands are unrealistic and do not take into account the highly competitive nature of the global auto industry, as well as the relative lack of competitiveness when comparing our costs to auto manufacturers in other countries.
    AMEO says that as a result of strike action the employers stand to lose more than 2100 cars per day (of which 50-percent are destined for export markets) and employees will lose over R8 million per day in total wages and benefits in respect of the 15,000 hourly employees in the industry.
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