South African Municipal Workers’ Union (Samwu) leaders will meet their employer, the South African Local Government Association (Salga), in Johannesburg on Wednesday afternoon to try to resolve an ongoing national strike, a spokesperson said.
“We will meet at Gallagher Estate in Midrand at 2pm,” union spokesperson Tahir Sema said.
“Salga must come to the negotiating table sober.”
The meeting comes after Samwu rejected Salga’s proposals to avert the strike.
It centres around a bid by Samwu to resolve seven years of negotiations to make middle- and lower-income municipal workers’ salaries market related.
The union said this would reduce salaries of higher-ranking, overpaid council employees, and would address corruption, which was seen as a reason for service delivery protests.
“These kinds of talks can go on for hours, even into the early parts of the morning,” Sema said.
On Tuesday, a bid by Salga to prohibit the industrial action was withdrawn in the Labour Court.
‘Worrying’
On Wednesday a group of protesting municipal workers stoned cars at the municipal hall in central Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape police spokesperson Captain Johan Rheede said.
“Today, if there is any damage to property, we will make arrests … we won’t tolerate this behaviour, it’s not like yesterday [Tuesday] when they were just throwing papers in the streets.”
In Ekurhuleni, east of Johannesburg, private security company the Red Ants allegedly threw stones at striking workers, after protests at a municipal building, Sema said.
“The Red Ants arrived with stones. We have confirmed reports of this … they began stoning workers and that’s when violence broke out. This is very worrying because there was no need for the Red Ants to be called.”
Workers were apparently stoned after a few bins were overturned.
“We see this as an instigation of violence … Samwu had marshals on the ground. We had all contingency matters in place, everything was under control.”
In Johannesburg, commuters who used council buses had to make alternative arrangements.
“Each region conducts their own protests and picketing, it’s quite huge,” Sema said.
He could not give an indication of how many workers were on strike. — Sapa