Johannesburg | Monday
About 30 0000 members of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) will join in the two-day anti-privatisation strike called by the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu), the union said on Tuesday.
”The privatisation of state assets, as seen through the strategic partnership ventures, has borne negative implications for thousands of workers through loss of jobs. Government’s pursuit of this process defeats logic in that it makes no sense to want to sell off national assets which are doing well in particular Eskom,” NUM said in a statement.
The union said contrary to the argument that such processes will bring competition and improve efficiency levels, Eskom was by far the best supplier of the cheapest electricity on the world.
”Its competency and efficiency in the delivery of electricity to poor communities is unquestionable. Why then should this asset be privatised?”
The union said the selling off of these assets would have a negative bearing on national development programmes, such as electrification, the installation of telephones, accessibility of water and so forth.
”Thus privatisation is not only affecting the workforce but the entire population of our country. It is the poor communities who will be denied access to these resources. It is also poor communities who suffer when there is an increase in the payment of telephone units,” the statement said.
”Consequently, this is a strike against poverty.” – Sapa