Amplats, Amcu taken to the Labour Court

File picture: Sxc.hu

File picture: Sxc.hu

Published Nov 8, 2016

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Johannesburg - The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and the United Association of South Africa (Uasa) yesterday took Anglo American Platinum (Amplats) and the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) to the Labour Court to question the validity of a three-year wage agreement signed last month.

The NUM and Uasa accused Amplats and Amcu of an unlawful, underhanded and secret salary agreement which comprised a R1 000 monthly increment for the lowest paid employees.

Uasa and the NUM tore at the agreement at Amplats, arguing that it flew in the face of the rights that both of them enjoyed as equal partners in terms of the Employment Relations Agreement (ERA) which bound the four parties.

Unlawful

Uasa and NUM want to be allowed to continue with the annual salary negotiations with Amplats in compliance with ERA , saying last month’s agreement between Amcu and Uasa was void because it was unlawfully concluded.

“It is clear to Uasa that both Amplats and Amcu have flouted the rule of law by the devious conclusion of this unlawful agreement. Orderly industrial relations are paramount to the economic stability of our economy.

“It is simply untenable that a blue-chip multinational corporation like Amplats has seen fit to ignore its duty to bargain with Uasa and NUM,” Franz Stehring, Uasa’s divisional manager for minerals said.

“Amcu is the biggest union in the platinum belt and led a five month strike in 2014 at Amplats, Lonmin and Impala Platinum. Its signing of a wage agreement with the world’s three biggest platinum producer signalled labour stability for the next three years. Uasa said it had made separate and more substantial proposals to Amplats management during the course of salary negotiations.

“Notwithstanding the fact that Uasa were engaging in good faith in the collective bargaining process with Anglo Platinum management and other trade unions, management appears to have seen fit to fraudulently take control of this collective bargaining process and to secretly negotiate and sign an unlawful agreement.” William Mabapa, NUM deputy general secretary and chief negotiator at Amplats said last week that the benefits were calculated from a lower base below their basic salaries and that is where the problem was. “Workers are highly ripped off in this agreement,” he said.

The NUM said it believed that even in the current signed three-year wage agreement the underground workers would still have not achieved the R12 500 wage increase, instead, they will only get R11 500.The R12 500 wage increase should have been achieved way back in 2012 by those who were campaigning for it.

The Labour Court is expected to deliver its judgment on the case tomorrow.

Uasa said it had made separate and more substantial proposals to Amplats management.

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