Two striking security guards have been arrested for setting fire to a warehouse at a Mondi paper mill, causing millions of rands in damage — this against a backdrop of intensifying industrial action and solidarity strikes.
Growing concerns over the vulnerability of business in general have prompted Business Unity South Africa (Busa) to urge the warring parties to break the two-month-long strike deadlock.
Police report that, on Saturday, striking security guards threatened the on-duty guard before torching the Mondi warehouse in Springs on the East Rand. The value of the paper in the building and the structure itself amounts to millions of rands, according to a general manager at Mondi, who said the investigation was ongoing.
Busa CEO Jerry Vilakazi said his organisation had informally conferred with security employer representatives in a bid to establish why negotiations were being held up.
Busa and the South African Chamber of Business have also voiced reservations about looming solidarity strikes in support of the striking union in the security industry, the South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu).
Satawu said these would involve 110Â 000 workers, a number that would swell as the Congress of South African Trade Unions made good on its pledge to support its affiliate’s efforts through pickets, demonstrations and marches.
But, while the federation turns the screws on employers to bow to Satawu’s pay and other demands, the parties to the dispute once again failed to find common ground last Friday, when they deadlocked after a week of exploratory talks at the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA).
This week, the Mail & Guardian interviewed five experienced mediators and negotiators to ask them how they thought the intractable dispute could be settled.
“In wage negotiations, it can be very difficult to get people to unpack a demand, because they assume a position immediately,” said Gina Barbieri of the Mediation Institute of Southern Africa. “The parties would have to move away from their entrenched positions and consider their underlying interests as the basis for an agreement,” she said.
One mediation strategy suggested by John Brand, a mediator for 20 years, is to ask the parties to consider the alternatives to continued failure to agree.
For the employers, the alternative to negotiating would be solidarity strikes and ongoing “guerrilla warfare” by a hostile union. The alternative to an agreement from the union’s perspective would be a continued lack of pay and possible disciplinary action afterwards, said Barbieri.
Barbieri suggested that if clients would agree to pay more for security services, their involvement could be used creatively to break the deadlock.
Arbitration might help break the deadlock by allowing the parties to “save face”, said Paul Pretorius, a senior advocate with mediation and arbitration experience. In this, both parties agree to be bound by the arbitrator’s decision, while a mediator can only facilitate an agreement.
A sticking point in the security industry talks has been the employers’ insistence that the union suspend the strike before pay talks begin.
Charles Nupen, the first director of the CCMA who now advises the International Labour Organisation, said: “One of the real difficulties is when parties start setting preconditions for negotiation.”
Nupen said that the preconditions should be on the table for negotiation, but should not be a barrier to discussing other issues.
He cited the acrimonious OK Bazaars strike of 1997, when parties agreed to a protocol on managing the conflict so that they could move on to the substantive issues.
The negotiators agreed that suspending the strike would weaken Satawu’s bargaining position.
“In the time I’ve been involved in mediation, I’ve never known a situation where people go back to work and then there are serious negotiations after that,” said Brand.
While the issue of disciplining workers for strike-related activities often arises during a strike, mediators can devise mechanisms to address this.
Previously successful mechanisms include allowing the CCMA or a CCMA commissioner to conduct the disciplinary hearings, said a seasoned mediator, who wished to remain anonymous because of his involvement in the security sector talks.