The Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration is functioning very well, writes Luvuyo Kakaza
It’s Friday morning and the modest headquarters of the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) in downtown Johannesburg are buzzing with activity.
It is in this commission’s noisy corridors that reluctant management teams and angry workers start to lobby before talks, in an attempt to reach speedy solutions to simmering labour disputes.
Last Friday, it was time for the transport industry to confront their employers over a wage dispute. Around the negotiation table, the CCMA’s director, Thandi Orleyn, and another commissioner were goalkeepers. The four unions – the Transport and General Workers’ Union, the Transport and Allied Workers’ Union, the Transport and Omnibus Workers’ Union and the Western Cape Omnibus and Salaried Staff Union, were demanding a 10% increase while employers were offering 7%. Initially, the unions demanded 13% while the companies offered 4,5%.
Harsh words by unionists were used against employers and the two parties were separated to cool off tempers.
However, a last-ditch effort by CCMA to end the strike failed. Instead, trade unions accused employers of arrogance and criticised their unwillingness to reach an agreement to end the nationwide strike by thousands of transport workers. In the corridors the wagging of fingers at employers were the order of the day. “Abelungu abosiboni [White people don’t respect us],” retorted one unionist.
According to commissioners, the use of bad language between opposing parties is a normal trend. “People come here with all sorts of attitudes and allegations and we have to oversee that the mediation process is carried out peacefully without taking sides,” says commissioner Rob McGregor.
Unresolved strike disputes that result in heated arguments between workers and employers are not new to the commission. However, a lot of strike disputes were resolved over the past three years.
Since its inception, in terms of the new Labour Relations Act, the CCMA has mediated in a number of wage strikes last year in the sugar, transport and private health sectors as well as in national chemical, mining and construction sectors, and made a major contribution to the drop in labour walkouts.
About two-thirds of the CCMA’s first 58 000 disputes last year were resolved. This resulted in last year’s 64% drop in union strike actions. This year 38 432 disputes were mediated, and 26 344 were settled by conciliation. About 5 642 cases were settled by conciliation at an arbitration hearing.
While strikes are the most powerful weapon of any union, Orleyn is convinced that the decline coincided with the implementation of the Labour Relations Act in 1996. The Act codifies issues that in the past were considered to be good labour practice, like retrenchments.
Under the auspices of the Act, she adds, the CCMA has acted to bring about the speedier resolution of disputes. Many unresolved cases go to arbitration, which means, says Orleyn, that the disputes will be resolved faster and cheaper than via litigation through the courts.
Trade union movements like the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) agree that the CCMA, replacing the Industrial Court, is a most important and speedy system.
“Attitudes among workers are slightly changing and they rather reach a deadlock in their negotiations with management before they can strike, ” says Orleyn. Strikes are a last resort in terms of reaching an agreement.
Though the system has created a friendlier working relationship between workers and employers, it has not been totally favourable to domestic and farm workers.
Orleyn agrees that the commission has not satisfactorily spread its wings to these sectors. “We must understand that these are not easily reachable sectors as they are not represented by unions.” Illiteracy has also been cited as one of the contributing factors, and rural areas have been left uncovered by the CCMA’s actions.
This year, the commission promises to focus on promoting effective strategies for dispute prevention. “More of our resources will be ploughed into public education,” says Sithembele Tshewe, the CCMA’s representative.
Public education projects based on the CCMA’s work are planned together with the SABC’s educational radio, to be transmitted next month in all official languages.
Trade union movements like Cosatu, labour analysts and workers feel the CCMA has become their next home, where disputes in the workplace can be resolved, to the benefit of the country’s economy.
“If South African business is to compete with the world’s economy, management and labour have to find ways of relating to each other,” says Orleyn. “There is need to a shift towards joint problem-solving and better communication in the workplace.”