Canadian-based uranium producing company Uranium One will retrench over 1Â 000 employees, trade union Solidarity said on Tuesday.
”Solidarity has received an Article 189 notice from Uranium One whereby the group gives notice that the retrenchment process for 1Â 013 of its 1Â 175 employees at its Dominion uranium mine outside Klerksdorp will begin”.
About 162 employees were expected to stay on ”to do the basic maintenance on the mine” while the other 1Â 013 employees would presumably be retrenched by January 11 2009.
”The price of uranium dropped considerably in the 11 months between December 2007 and October this year. The worldwide economic problems have also placed further pressure on the company,” Solidarity said.
Furthermore, the cost of explosives rose by 70% since March while the price of sulphuric acid increased by 290% since the mine opened two years ago.
The mine also experienced problems in achieving its production targets, Solidarity added.
”Management has now decided to place the mine under so called ‘care and maintenance’ which means that only the necessary maintenance work will be done in the mine.
”No further production will take place at the mine,” said Solidarity spokesperson Jaco Kleynhans.
”According to our calculations the more than 1Â 000 employees being retrenched will lead to more than 8Â 000 dependants being left without an income by 11 January, 2009,” said Kleynhans.
Meanwhile the mine had also indicated that it would only pay out the minimum severance pay, of one week’s pay for every year’s service, to employees, Solidarity said.
Efforts to reach Uranium One were unsuccessful. – Sapa