OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Tuesday
THE South African Post Office has been granted an urgent court interdict preventing about 1_400 striking postal workers from intimidating other workers following violent clashes in Johannesburg and Pretoria.
The strike turned violent when strikers attacked the cars of their fellow workers who had decided not to go on strike.
Members of the Communication Workers’ Union embarked on the strike last week after a dispute with the Post Office on changes to terms and conditions of employment at the parastatal.
Post Office spokesman Ben Rootman said 70 post offices have been closed as a result of the CWU strike.
Police clashed with the striking workers at Witspos, the Johannesburg post office sorting centre, after they prevented cars belonging to employees on duty from leaving the premises.
The police intervened as the tension increased but the workers refused to give up and they allegedly started hitting cars with sticks.
At the mail centre at Johannesburg International Airport, striking workers were teargassed, arrested and later released.
In Pretoria, about striking workers converged on the Pretoria police station to lay a charge against a Post Office security guard after a shot was fired at workers outside the Tshwane mail centre on Monday morning.
Post Office management said it had instituted a national lockout and had started using scab labour to ensure mail was delivered, following the continuation of the strike.
The CWU is also demanding the Post Office continues to pay about 900 people in the Witwatersrand area triple pay for normal work on Sundays as opposed to time-and-a-half.
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