Peter Dickson
In a move the police have codenamed Operation Beetle, a squad of 200 armed public order officers has been deployed to Uitenhage to keep the peace after car-maker Volkswagen’s sacking of 1E300 factory workers.
Police hope Operation Beetle will prevent further incidents of post-strike intimidation that has already resulted in the hospitalisation of a former union member whose home was petrol-bombed.
A dismissed striker has been arrested in connection with the attack, which took place amid rising tension between the axed strikers and Volkswagen employees.
At 3am last Thursday, troops cordoned off a section of Kwanobu-hle, home to the bulk of Volkswagen South Africa’s 6E000-strong workforce, after which 200 armed police began systematic house-to-house searches that ended with two arrests for assault – one for dagga possession and one for failure to appear in court on an unspecified charge.
Police reinforcements have been brought from as far as Oudtshoorn in the Western Cape to “monitor potential conflict” between dismissed workers and Volkswagen employees.
The 1E300 workers were dismissed after engaging in an illegal strike earlier this month in protest against the National Union of Mineworkers’ (Numsa) firing of 13 shop stewards for undisciplined behaviour.
The shop stewards who were axed by the union had been protesting against a deal struck between Numsa and Volkswagen in terms of which workers would put in extra hours without breaks to meet key export orders.
It was when these shop stewards, who tried to stop other employees from working, were fired, that the 1E300 went on strike. Volkswagen dismissed the illegal strikers after they ignored an ultimatum to return to work.
Within days of last Thursday’s swoop, the unemployed Volkswagen staffers were busy planning further factory protests and holding talks with the area’s largest taxi associations to bring business in this Eastern Cape motor town to a complete standstill.
The dismissed workers, as well as a number of Volkswagen’s employees, backed embarking on go-slows, lunchtime pickets and also petitions to force Volkswagen to rehire the 1E300 workers who were dismissed. The special police squad is expected to remain in the area until further notice.
Volkswagen’s communications manager, Matt Gennrich, confirmed this week that the chairs of both Volkswagen International and Volkswagen South Africa had discussed the strike with President Thabo Mbeki at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland.
The following week, in his State of the Nation address, Mbeki slammed the strikers for tarnishing South Africa’s reputation in the eyes of international investors.
The strike cost the Post Elizabeth harbour – which is Volkswagen’s gateway to Europe for the R5-billion Golf export contract – more than R400-million in lost business, reporters were told at a news conference held by the Port Elizabeth Regional Chamber of Commerce and Industry on Tuesday.
Volkswagen is currently screening 23E000 job applications for its Uitenhage operation in the wake of the dismissals.