NUM temporarily saves Anglogold Ashanti jobs

Picture: Itumeleng English

Picture: Itumeleng English

Published Jan 23, 2017

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Johannesburg – The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) on Monday, said that it had successfully negotiated an agreement to avoid retrenchments at AngloGold Ashanti following the mine's decision to lay off more than 800 workers at it's South African operations.

NUM met with Anglogold Ashanti with the purpose to seek avoidance measures that would minimise the retrenchment of workers to zero after the gold miner issued Section 189 notice to retrench 849 workers.

Last week, NUM called on Anglogold Ashanti to rethink its position to retrench and said the union would fight tooth and nail to make sure that its members were not retrenched cheaply.

On Monday NUM Mining Coordinator at AngloGold Ashanti Tafa Moya, said the union and the miner agreed that workers would be transferred to other business units within the company and the other workers would be re-skilled for other jobs.

"This is work in progress and we will continue meeting with the company to protect worker's job security," Moya said. AngloGold Ashanti spokesperson Chris Nthite confirmed the meeting, but said it was too early to predict the overall outcome of the agreement.

"We met with the organised labour representatives of our employees today as planned, to discuss the Section 189 notice which involves – amongst other things – exploring steps to mitigate job losses," Nthite said. "This engagement is ongoing and it remains too early to pre-empt an outcome."

African News Agency

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