Metrorail may call in the defence force to combat almost daily deaths on trains in the safety vacuum left by the security guards’ strike.
”We are concerned that almost every day people die or are injured on the trains, because it’s not normal for Metrorail,” said Metrorail spokesperson Thandi Mlangeni.
Recent train fatalities resulted from people being pushed from trains, she said, while typical train deaths involved people ”surfing” on the top of trains in motion or crossing the tracks.
Metrorail personnel are working with the police to ensure commuter safety, and on Tuesday the organisation considered calling on the defence force — an option that is still on the table.
According to its manager, Pieter Roux, 40% of the workforce of Hlanganani Protection Services, one of the 12 firms guarding Metrorail, were absent because of the strike.
Train guards are soft targets because strikers can access the trains easily and know train routes, he said.
Yet Boyane Tshela of the Institute for Security Studies said he was not convinced that striking workers were responsible for the increase in crime on trains.
”The very fact that there are no security guards on the trains means that the passengers are vulnerable,” he said, adding that only a court conviction would prove strikers’ responsibility.
Police spokespersons said that police have arrested 62 strikers in Gauteng and the Western Cape but no arrests have been made in connection with train deaths.
Despite the glimmer of a resolution to the month-long South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) strike last week, the parties have made little progress towards that elusive goal.
Employers said they would meet Satawu at the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration on Friday if it suspended the strike and included other unions in talks.
Satawu will negotiate with other unions but will not suspend the strike, said the union’s sector co-ordinator, Jackson Simon, adding that members viewed employers’ efforts to declare the strike illegal as a sign of bad faith.
On Thursday, employers appealed against a Labour Court decision that the strike was legal. That application was dismissed with costs.
But while employer negotiators have stonewalled on the issue of an 11% wage increase, Western Cape security companies are entertaining the proposal.
Medium-sized firms, which have cut profit margins to make the offer, said that a few dominant multinational security firms are prolonging the strike to squeeze out smaller businesses.
”For heavens’ sake, if you can’t find the money, then you shouldn’t be in business,” said AndrÃ