Unions across the board have stood firm on wage demands, but employers say giving in to these would have dire consequences for the industry.
A slow, sure, violent implosion appears to be building in South Africa’s largest and formerly most powerful union – the National Union of Mineworkers.
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/ 1 November 2011
NUM has reached a wage agreement with Exxaro Coal, which included the joining of its non-member operations to the Chamber of Mines by 2013.
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/ 16 September 2011
Despite their campaign against Mswati’s despotic rule, Cosatu affiliates have been found to be involved in business deals with the Swazi king.
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/ 8 September 2011
NUM workers at Eskom are preparing to strike after wage talks failed, but Eskom says it is protected by its status as an essential service provider.
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/ 1 September 2011
The NUM says Eskom’s "unilateral" implementation of a two-year, 7% wage agreement is a declaration of war, and it would put up a fight.
The National Union of Mineworkers will meet negotiators in a bid to avert a wage strike that could hurt the world’s second largest producer.
Eskom has increased its wage offer to unions, in a bid to prevent a prolonged strike that could cut power and bring disaster to the economy.
The economy will lose more working hours if planned strikes by hundreds of thousands of workers in the coal and diamond sector go ahead.
The petroleum, chemical and mining industries — key sectors in the economy — are bracing themselves for rolling mass action starting next week.
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/ 17 November 2010
The National union of Mineworkers called the South African Chamber of Mines liars for saying there has been an improvement on safety in mines.
Workers at power utility Eskom could go on strike by Thursday if their demands for an 18% wage hike are not met, a union spokesperson said on Monday.
Gold Fields’ South Deep mine remained closed on Monday ahead of a meeting between the company and the Gauteng mines safety inspector to determine whether conditions were safe enough for operations to continue. Nine people died at the company’s South Deep mine last Thursday.
Nine miners have died after an accident at the Gold Fields South Deep mine near Randfontein in Gauteng, the chief inspector of mines said on Thursday. Thabo Gazi said he received a report about the accident at about 12pm. It is believed that a conveyance in an inclined shaft fell down the shaft after the rope snapped.
Intervention by the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) on Wednesday brought an end to the pay dispute between workers and management at the 2010 Soccer World Cup Mbombela Stadium in Nelspruit. Spokesperson Lusanda Myoli said an agreement was reached after two days of intense negotiations.
The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has had enough of the 2010 stadium labour disputes and has now asked Fifa president Sepp Blatter to intervene. There have been a number of strikes over wage disputes by construction workers working on the Green Point stadium in Cape Town, Durban’s Moses Mabhida stadium and the Mbombela stadium in Nelspruit.
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/ 4 December 2007
The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) launched a one-day strike on Tuesday to protest against deaths in the country’s mines, disrupting operations across the world’s top producer of platinum and gold. Almost a quarter of a million union members were set to down tools in the first industry-wide strike on safety, as the death toll mounted to about 200.
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/ 4 December 2007
The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) launched a one-day national strike on Tuesday to protest against deaths in the country’s mines, disrupting operations across the world’s top producer of platinum and gold. Almost a quarter of a million NUM members are expected to down tools in the first industry-wide strike on safety.
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/ 3 December 2007
The strike by construction workers at the 20101 World Cup Mbombela Stadium in Nelspruit, Mpumalanga, entered its fifth day on Monday, the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said. Workers affiliated to the NUM downed tools on Wednesday last week demanding better pay and working conditions.
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/ 2 December 2007
South Africa’s powerful mining union will stage its first nationwide strike of the post-apartheid era on Tuesday in a signal that patience over the industry’s safety record has reached breaking point. About 250 000 miners are to down tools in a protest union chiefs say could be intensified if employers do not make significant inroads into the levels of fatalities.
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/ 27 November 2007
South Africa’s National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) said on Tuesday it had been given the go-ahead by authorities to stage a one-day nationwide strike on December 4 to highlight the issue of safety at mines. ”Yes, we are going on strike on December 4, we have been given the go-ahead,” NUM spokesperson Lesiba Seshoka said.
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/ 21 November 2007
South Africa’s preparations for the 2010 Soccer World Cup were dealt a new blow on Wednesday by a fresh bout of strike action by construction workers at one of the host stadiums. The latest strike came as thousands of delegates and journalists began arriving in South Africa ahead of this weekend’s draw in Durban.
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/ 15 November 2007
Work is to resume at Goldfield’s Beatrix mine in the Free State on Thursday following clashes between workers that saw four people die. ”Employee groups have been in discussions all day and have reached agreement to return to work and deal with the issues they’ve had in an amicable manner,” said a Goldfields spokesperson.
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/ 15 November 2007
Group Five and the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) were on Thursday locked in negotiations in a bid to stop the strike at the Moses Mabhida Stadium from spreading to other 2010 stadiums under construction. NUM national spokesperson Lesiba Seshoka said the two sides had met on Wednesday evening and talks had resumed again on Thursday morning.
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/ 15 November 2007
The death toll following a clash at a National Union of Mineworkers (NUM)’s meeting at Goldfields’ Beatrix mine in the Free State, has risen to four, a mine spokesperson said on Thursday. Two people were clubbed to death and died at a meeting of about 750 NUM members on Tuesday night.
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/ 5 November 2007
South Africa’s AngloGold Ashanti said it expected a government inspection to be conducted on Monday at one of its larger mines, which was shut on Friday after a miner was killed in a rock-fall. AngloGold shut its TauTona mine after the worker died in the early hours of Friday.
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/ 2 November 2007
AngloGold Ashanti shut one of its larger mines in South Africa on Friday after a miner was killed in a rockfall as a miners’ strike to protest against the spate of mine deaths in the country loomed. AngloGold, the world’s third-biggest gold producer, shut its TauTona mine after the worker died in the early hours of Friday.
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/ 18 October 2007
The world’s biggest producer of platinum, Anglo Platinum, said on Thursday it shut a shaft at its largest operation on Wednesday after one worker was killed, sending platinum prices to a new record. Simon Tebele, a spokesperson at AngloPlat, could not say for how long the Paardekraal shaft in Rustenburg would be closed.
Almost 600 miners of the 3 200 trapped underground have been rescued from Harmony Gold’s Elandsrand mine on Thursday morning. The cause of the accident was in dispute, the National Union of Mineworkers attributing it to a rock fall, the company saying a pipe carrying chilled water down the shaft, to cool air underground, broke and damaged equipment.