With indications that striking gold miners would accept their employers’ latest wage offer, union bosses awaited a final response on Thursday afternoon.
”It’s looking positive. I’m waiting for the final verdict from the chief negotiator,” Solidarity spokesperson Reint Dykema said on the fifth day of the strike.
The Chamber of Mines — representing mining houses Anglo Gold Ashanti, Harmony Gold, Western Areas and Gold Fields — on Wednesday presented unions with an offer of between 6% and 7%.
Solidarity’s 10 000 members joined the strike on Monday night, after 80 000 workers belonging to the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) began the strike on Sunday.
”We’re feeling positive. We won’t be in a firm position to give a final answer until Friday afternoon,” the United Association of South Africa’s Tim Kruger said in response to the new offer.
NUM spokesperson Moferefere Lekorotsoana said the union’s 70 leaders were arriving in Johannesburg to present their members’ mandates on the latest offer.
”We’re still far from saying anything,” he said.
Earlier on Thursday, he said: ”There’s an optimism about the current offer. They came close to what we asked for.
”They [employers] moved from 2,5% to between 6% and 7%. That’s a serious movement. It came about because people are pushing very hard.”
Unions were demanding an increase of between 8% and 12%.
The chief negotiator at the Chamber of Mines, Frans Barker, said he had nothing to report. — Sapa