It was a phone call from mineworkers’ union boss Gwede Mantashe to the mining companies’ chief negotiator, Dr Frans Barker, just before 4pm last Tuesday that put the matter beyond doubt.
The call, in which Mantashe told Barker that the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) had rejected the Chamber of Mines’s final pay offer, set the stage for the first nationwide mine strike in 15 years.
After caucusing for six continuous hours, the overwhelming worker sentiment was that the chamber’s offer for underground gold miners, of between 9% and 10%, would not do.
They would stand fast on a demand for a minimum wage of R2 000 a month for all operators, further increases in employer contributions to the retirement fund and the upgrading of all operators in the industry from skill category four to category six. More than 100 000 workers could down tools.
According to the chamber, these will raise labour costs — which account for more than half the costs in a labour-intensive industry — by 38%. Immediately in the firing line are three gold producers, Gold Fields, AngloGold and Harmony Gold Mining. A number of mining companies have broken ranks and offered separate wage deals to the union. The NUM will consider their revised offers on Monday. Also facing strike action due to start on Sunday are some of the collieries, including Ingwe and Kuyasa.
Immediately after receiving the message, Barker called the various mining houses’ representatives to the chamber’s headquarters in central Johannesburg. After another inspection of their financial accounts and projections, they concluded they could not accommodate the NUM’s demand.
Central to their deliberations is the continuing strength of the rand. By slashing export earnings from gold in recent months, this had placed their margins under enormous pressure, they maintained.
“We can’t afford anything more, and if the union doesn’t reconsider, I’m afraid we will have a strike. In our view, they’re being unreasonable. We’re offering fair increases that are above the inflation rate,” Barker said in justifying the decision.”You can’t upgrade jobs through collective bargaining,” he added. “Jobs can only be graded by experts who look at the job functions.”
The chamber estimates the current inflation rate at 7,8%.
The NUM argues that the mining houses did not share their profits with workers in better times, and were now expecting workers to make a sacrifice.
“I don’t understand this concept that when the currency strengthens it becomes a threat,” added Mantashe. “My understanding of economics is that the strength of the currency reflects the health of an economy. It can’t be regarded as a problem.”
In the second quarter of last year, the biggest boom in the history of gold-mining, sparked by a weak rand and an improved gold price, started to wane. Since the gold standard was scrapped in the 1970s, the industry has seen no fewer than eight boom and bust cycles.
The gold mines have not seen industry-wide strike action since 1987, when Cyril Ramaphosa and Elijah Barayi led more than 500 000 workers out on a three-week strike that paralysed production and cost the industry a ton of gold.
Coinciding with worker militancy at the height of the last apartheid government’s state of emergency, the strike was broken when Anglo American fired 50 000 workers.
That setback, coupled with the loss of worker leaders to the new democratic government and a steady haemorrhage of mining jobs during the 1990s, has significantly weakened the NUM. Gold mining jobs have more than halved from peak to 200 000.
Two years ago strike action was narrowly averted.
On the collieries, the NUM is demanding that Ingwe increase its contribution rate to the retirement fund in line with other mines, which are offering an immediate increase of 1% and a further 0,45% rise from July next year.
Kuyasa, which has pleaded that it is a newly established empowerment company, also faces demands that it offer a pay rise and increases in contributions to the retirement fund in line with the rest of the industry.
Morale among gold miners was so high on Thursday that they were staging enthusiastic meetings to prepare for Sunday’s strike.
NUM spokesperson Moferefere Lekorotsoana said workers were determined to go on strike. “We are dealing with a team that is much more united to see the whole issue through than in 2001. In that year there was mobilisation, but the whole thing was stopped at the 11th hour.
“People feel they have contributed to the industry’s success but are not getting their share of the pie.
“During the last two years, while the bosses were reaping millions, mine workers continued to die underground They made the ultimate sacrifice to make managers look good, but the survivors have nothing to show for it.”