Durban - KwaZulu-Natal forensic pathology services resume on Friday after a four-day strike over employment conditions linked to job grading, backpay and organisational structure.
The Public and Allied Workers Union announced its decision to stop the strike at the meeting with the provincial Health Department’s management on Thursday.
Workers throughout the province downed tools on Monday
.
The union’s KZN secretary, Halalisani Gumede, confirmed that workers would return to their posts on Friday. “All our demands were met because they were long overdue. We have made plans for the outstanding issues and the strike has been called off,” he said.
Health MEC Sibongiseni Dhlomo said the “illegal industrial action” had caused disruptions in some forensic pathology mortuaries.
Families had to postpone funerals, not knowing when the bodies of their loved ones would be released, after post-mortems were not conducted in some mortuaries.
On Thursday The Mercury visited Durban’s Magwaza Maphalala (Gale) Street Mortuary and found families at the gate after being told that bodies could not be released until post-mortems were done. But health spokesman Desmond Motha said there was no backlog.
The Mercury