Johannesburg | Tuesday
CHUBB Protection Services said on Monday it had won a court interdict against striking security personnel affiliated to the SA Transport and Allied Workers Union (Satawu).
The strike, which Satawu called on March 1, revolves around wage issues and resulted in long customer queues in some banks in central Johannesburg on its first day on Monday.
Chubb representative Alison Bull claimed that incidents of intimidation, violence and damage to Chubb property had marred the strike and that the company was forced to seek an interdict against Satawu.
”Certain of today’s incidents were so unruly that the South African Police Service were compelled to intervene. Numerous non-striking employees were assaulted, with some having to be hospitalised and one female employee was forcibly removed from a site. The employee in question is still unaccounted for,” Bull said.
Bull said that contrary to Satawu’s claims that the strike was countrywide, only about 500 were participating and were limited to Gauteng.
Disputing Satawu representative Jerry Ngcobo’s earlier claim that over 1500 members countrywide were taking part in the work stoppage, Bull said the strikers were only from the Johannesburg, East Rand and Pretoria areas.
The company had been trying to get Satawu into talks to avert the action since Friday.
One of the workers’ grievances is the company’s pay cycle, which they say should be changed from 45 days to the last day of the month.
But Bull said of this: ”In respect of the demand relating to the 45-day pay cycle, the company changed the pay cycle and not the payment date three months ago by way of an agreement which the union was party to”.
Ngcobo could not be reached to respond to Bull’s claims. – Sapa