Police fired rubber bullets at protesting guards after they apparently set alight a security van in Pretoria on Thursday afternoon. Guards made their way to Church Square, trashing rubbish bins and causing havoc in the city centre. Shops were also set alight.
The violence came on the first afternoon of a security-guard strike affecting seven provinces.
The guards were part of a march delivering memorandums bearing their grievances to the departments of labour and safety and security as well as the industry’s regulator.
The Private Security Regulatory Authority’s headquarters are in Beatrix Street.
Tshwane emergency services spokesperson Johan Pieterse said firefighters were sent to a blaze near the corner of Schoeman and Beatrix streets in the city centre. He said he could not comment on the incident as it was a police matter.
Police spokesperson Inspector Paul Ramaloko said complaints about protesters vandalising property had been received. ”We could only tell you at the end of the day if it was so,” he said.
One report suggested that protesters tried to storm the First National Bank branch on the corner of Vermeulen and Beatrix streets.
A police helicopter was monitoring the scene.
Security employers also reported increasing levels of intimidation, especially in Pretoria and Cape Town, where a march to hand over a petition was also held.
South African National Security Employers’ Association (Sansea) spokesperson Steve Friswel said some uniformed guards were dragged from their workplace and forced to participate in the march in Pretoria.
There was also a report of a guard stripped of his uniform in the Cape and beaten.
Friswel said there was little absenteeism in Johannesburg and the East and West Rand. Some Sansea members reported 100% attendance. In the Cape and Pretoria, however, some companies reported 80% absenteeism.
Sansea represents about 110 security companies that employ between 50 000 and 60 000 guards. There are about 283 700 registered guards in South Africa, working for 4 200 registered businesses. About 90 000 are unionised.
Sansea is one of five employer associations affected by the two-day strike that began in seven provinces on Thursday.
Cape Town
In Cape Town, several thousand guards marched on Parliament amid a strong police presence.
South African Trade and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) leaders addressed the large crowd at Parliament’s gates, threatening another strike if their demands were not met within seven days.
”We are here to let them understand that we can make the country stand still until our demands are met,” an official said over the public address system. ”We strongly believe workers in this sector are getting a raw deal.”
Minister of Labour Membathisi Mdladlana is the only one able to make a decent sectoral determination for the industry’s workers. ”We will use all tactics at our disposal [to have our demands met],” the official said.
After a memorandum was handed over to a Department of Labour representative, another was presented to Deputy Minister of Safety and Security Susan Shabangu, herself a veteran trade unionist.
She promised to see the matter was given attention, and appealed to the sometimes restless crowd for discipline and to refrain from violence during their protest.
Satawu leaders repeatedly called on the crowd for order and calm, saying workers should not lose direction and needed to remain disciplined if they wanted their demands met.
Marchers dispersed peacefully in several directions following the handover of the memorandums.
Unions
The unions involved in the strike are Satawu, the National Security and Unqualified Workers’ Union, the Professional Transport Workers’ Union of South Africa, the Security Officer Civil Rights and Allied Workers’ Union, the South African Private Security Workers’ Union, the South African Cleaning, Security and Allied Workers’ Union, the United Private Sector Workers’ Union, the Protectors Workers’ Union, the Food, Cleaning and Security Workers’ Union and the South African National Security Officers’ Forum.
The industrial action in Gauteng, Mpumalanga, Limpopo, the North West, Free State, Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal follows failed wage negotiations that started in October last year. Unions are demanding an 11% across-the-board increase and an additional 4% increase for the lowest-paid workers.
Guards in the Northern and Eastern Cape provinces will strike on Monday and Tuesday, with KwaZulu-Natal workers joining for a repeat strike.
Should a settlement not be reached by then, workers will strike indefinitely from April 3. — Sapa