Thousands of municipal workers will start a three-day strike from Wednesday in a push for a decent wage increase, the South African Municipal Workers’ Union (Samwu) said on Tuesday.
”The South African Local Government Association [Salga] needs to see sense. They cannot expect workers, who often support extended families, to be satisfied with [their] current offer,” said Samwu president Petrus Mashishi.
Samwu wants a wage increase of the greater of 9% or R400 and a new minimum wage of R3 000 per month.
Salga is offering a 6% increase, which the union described as ”ridiculously low”. For example, workers earning R3 000 a month will get an increase of only R180 a month.
The union, which has dubbed its strike ”Project Escalate” in a retort to government’s municipal rescue plan ”Project Consolidate”, said each negative response from Salga will be met with an ever-increasing number of strike days.
Union members will be marching to mayors in the various towns and cities across the country to hand over memorandums calling on them to give Salga negotiators a new, improved mandate.
Pickets and sit-ins at municipal depots are other forms of action that will take place.
”Strikes are always a last resort for workers. They invariably involve further sacrifice. But workers are sick and tired of the levels of exploitation they experience on a daily basis,” said Samwu general secretary Roger Ronnie.
He said members want to see a real improvement on their living standards, and asking for a R400 increase is not ”unreasonable”. — Sapa