About 1 700 workers at tyre firm Goodyear in Port Elizabeth were expected to embark on an indefinite strike this week after management had reportedly refused to permanently employ 300 temporary workers for the past five years, the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) said in a statement on Monday.
According to the trade union, the temporary workers had suffered “repression” from labour broker Kelly staffing agency, which had denied them medical aid and provident-fund benefits for five years.
The tyre company said it would issue a press statement later on Monday.
Some of the temporary employees who suffered from chronic illnesses had not been able to get medical attention because the firm had refused to give them medical assistance when they could not afford high medical bills, the trade union said.
“We have done all in our power to persuade the management to change its intransigent approach on this matter for the past two years. And, the new tyre and manufacturing bargaining council has also failed to resolve the dispute, leaving us with no other alternative but to embark on a disruptive strike action,” Numsa local organiser Andile Zitho said ahead of the strike, the exact date of which is yet to be decided.
The union was also at loggerheads with the management over its misuse of workers who were on learner-ship internship programmes. It was also unhappy with the way learners had been treated as they were forced to work normal shifts and worked overtime for 2 000 rand a month, the union said.
“Workers on leaner-ship programmes were not supposed to work in the production operations on night shifts and over weekends. But management insisted that it would keep them on production lines because there were no modules to learn in classes,” the trade union argued.
“Numsa is also deeply frustrated by management inconsistencies on government policies regarding learnerships and the employment of contract workers for more than six months, without affording them basic benefits in terms of the Labour Relations Act.” — I-Net Bridge