The trade union Solidarity on Wednesday announced that it will go ahead with strike action against Nationwide Airline following a deadlock in negotiations.
Solidarity spokesperson Jaco Kleynhans said the union has given Nationwide a 48-hour strike warning, which will expire on Friday.
He said negotiations ”came to nothing” on Wednesday when Nationwide refused to budge from its offer of a 4% increase.
”We returned to negotiations today, prepared to lower our demand, but Nationwide’s recalcitrant attitude unfortunately wiped out all chances of a settlement. We are left with no choice but to carry on with our planned strike,” Kleynhans said.
He said the union renewed its demand that the company disclose its financial statements, which, he alleged, it refused.
”The company maintains that it cannot afford to offer our members a higher salary increase, but it refuses to give us access to its financial statements.”
He said Nationwide has appointed a ”costly” crisis-communications specialist to try to ”crisis-communicate” its way out of the impending strike.
”We would much rather have seen the company appoint a dispute-resolution specialist.
”It is clear that Nationwide does not have the will to resolve the dispute with Solidarity, which is why it has retained a crisis-communications specialist to shift the blame for the potentially grave consequences of the strike on to Solidarity.”
Solidarity’s 320 members that are employees of Nationwide are expected to embark on the strike at 5pm on Friday. — Sapa