The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has lashed out at state power utility Eskom for allegedly trying to unilaterally implement a revised wage offer of 5.6% and for lodging a dispute at the Commission for Conciliation Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) after unions rejected the offer.

NUM General Secretary Frans Baleni says the union fully supports the demands tabled by its members and has appealed to the utility to accept them.

“It is totally unacceptable for Eskom to declare a dispute with the CCMA when it is the unions that are aggrieved by its intransigence; and as a union we are infuriated by Eskom‘s behavior particularly as it seeks to unilaterally implement by hook or crook a five year wage agreement,”says Baleni.

“We reject the notion of a package deal for Eskom workers. We reject a multi-year agreement and call on Eskom to meet the demands of our members. Eskom workers are forever been provoked by their employer simply on the basis that they are labelled essential services,” he added.

Baleni says the NUM is concerned about the effect of Eskom’s decision on the morale of the workforce with workers embarking on unprotected strikes at the Matla power station in Mpumalanga and elsewhere.

“The NUM calls for heads to roll at Eskom’s top management for inciting workers into illegal, unprotected strike action, refusing to listen to employees and thus creating a rupture in the parastatal’s industrial relations,” he says.
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