Solidarity is out for blood after Lonmin revoked recognition of the union when signing a new winner-takes-all deal with the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) this week.

Now that the partnership between the company and the union is over, Solidarity says it will no longer turn a blind eye to the company’s alleged wrongdoings.

The Amcu recognition agreement, which will take effect from 2014, was announced on Wednesday afternoon just hours after Solidarity was told it would be derecognised.

“We will make sure we first explore every single legal avenue to fight this issue. There is no more goodwill and we will challenge them on every single issue,” the Solidarity general secretary, Gideon du Plessis, said.

“At the Saffy shaft, there was a fatality today [on August 14] … last week there was a mud rush. They did not report [either incident] to the department of mineral resources …

“We will take the social and labour plan, we will go through it clause by clause. We know there are many things they are not complying with … we won’t turn a blind eye any more.”

Auditing

Lonmin, however, said both accusations were entirely untrue as both incidents had been reported. A regulatory release on the afternoon of the 15th stated that the department had stopped all operations at the shaft. The company also said the social and labour plan goes through an auditing process with KPMG and the department also does onsite inspections.

The department did not respond to the Mail & Guardian’s request for clarification.

Du Plessis said the notice for derecognition came as a surprise. Solidarity felt it had been betrayed.

“They have been telling us all along they would never sign it [the recognition agreement in its existing form], that it would be suicide and they might as well hand over the keys to their office to Amcu if they did it.”

As stipulated in the new agreement, the threshold for basic rights, such as access and deductions, would be set at 30% of the workforce; for the right to full-time shop stewards and representation of members, unions would need to meet a threshold of 40%; and a 50%+1 threshold would determine a majority union status.

Reign

The 50%+1 was the key threshold during the National Union of Mineworkers’ (NUM’s) reign over the past 17 years, although these agreements gave a special dispensation to Solidarity and United Association of South Africa (Uasa).

Also, in the former structure, Lonmin’s workforce was divided into two bargaining units: one that represented lower-level workers, where Amcu holds a 75% majority, and another smaller bargaining unit, higher-level workers, who are largely represented by the NUM, Uasa and Solidarity, which amounted to 23%, Du Plessis said.

The new recognition agreement collapses the two into one, automatically making Amcu the majority union overall and the only one with enough representation to have organisational and bargaining rights.

Both Lonmin and Amcu said previously they would search for a more inclusive arrangement, and the framework agreement for a sustainable mining industry, signed by Lonmin but not Amcu, states that the principle of majoritarianism must be re-evaluated.

The NUM spokesperson, Lesiba Seshoka, said the new recognition agreement flew in the face of the framework agreement and that majoritarianism was “problematically entrenched” in the agreement.

Solidarity and Uasa represent only a small percentage of the entire workforce but this still translates into 4 500 skilled workers – which, Du Plessis said, “could bring the mine to a standstill easily … For us, it’s a constitutional issue – they have taken the right of freedom of association away for those employees.”

Our 24-page special edition on the aftermath of Marikana and its effect on the families can be found at mg.co.za/marikana

Unions decline to share Marikana event in interests of peace 

Although the National Union of Mineworkers (the NUM) has said it appreciates an invitation from the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) to share the stage at the first anniversary commemoration service of the Marikana massacre, the risk of a clash between the rival unions remains too high for a shared service to take place.

The spokesperson for the NUM, Lesiba Seshoka, said this week that the NUM would probably hold a separate ceremony in the interests of keeping the peace.

Amcu has organised the main ceremony, which will be attended by religious leaders, Julius Malema’s Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), Themba Godi’s African Peoples’ Convention, civil rights groups and the families of the men who died at the massacre.

Workers attending the ceremony will lose a day’s pay, Lonmin’s chief executive told reporters this week. But on hearing this news, workers took no more than 30 minutes to agree to the terms, advocate Dali Mpofu said. Mpofu is representing the injured and arrested miners at the Farlam Commission of Inquiry, and was recently elected by the workers to a Marikana anniversary organising committee.

The EFF’s convenor for the North West, Alfred Motsi, said that the fledgling party was helping to “mobilise” for the event. He said the workers had told him they did not want to see red T-shirts, emblematic of the NUM, on Friday.

“If the NUM participates, it’s going to be bad,” Motsi said. “For stability, we need to address our members individually about the need for peace. We can then work together towards addressing a joint gathering. But we want to do away with the tensions and the resentment first.”

Resentment

The NUM is all too aware of the resentment towards it, and the feeling is mutual. “The likelihood of violence is high, given that one of our shop stewards was killed this week,” Seshoka said.

The police are taking no chances, either. North West police spokesman, Brigadier Thulani Ngubane said that the police would be at the memorial service, and that they wanted peace.

“Let it be a commemoration without fear. Children should be allowed to be there. It is their right. Let the environment be a commemorative one. We do not want to see anything that goes against the rule of law,” Ngubane said.

But will the police be armed with live ammunition, as they were on August 16 2012?

With an uncomfortable laugh, Ngubane answers: “These are police officers we are talking about.

“By virtue of the SAPS Act, they are part of the armed forces. Police officers won’t go to a scene without a firearm.” – (Sarah Evans)