The South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) has accepted a deadlock-breaking pay offer from South African Airways (SAA), a union spokesperson said on Thursday.
”There was some resistance, but we took a leadership decision to sign,” Ronnie Mamba said.
The other striking union, the United Association of South Africa (Uasa), had already said earlier it would sign the agreement.
Uasa airline workers were returning to their posts on Thursday.
The new agreement means that employees will receive a 6% salary adjustment, according to Uasa.
”This includes a 5% across-the-board adjustment, which includes an adjustment to company contributions to, for example, medical and housing allowances, plus an additional 1% non-pensionable adjustment,” a Uasa statement said.
The airline has been operating at an estimated 25% capacity since the start of the strike last Friday in a disagreement over the 5% pay increase it offered. The unions wanted 8%.
Uasa spokesperson Andre Venter said members had already started returning to work and hoped that services would be back to normal by Friday.
He said they were not happy with the offer, but had to make a choice.
”It was more worth it in the sense that we proved that SAA is not as omnipotent as they think they are.”
He said it was the biggest strike in the history of SAA and had been a good learning experience.
”There was some kind of a liberation feeling — a feeling of ‘this is our airline, and we will show you’,” he said of the national carrier. — Sapa