Cape Town - Striking MyCiTi bus drivers will not be back behind the wheel on Thursday. Around 50 drivers employed by operating company Transpeninsula Investments knocked off at work at 2pm on Wednesday and gathered at the bus depot in De Waterkant, peacefully singing and dancing through to the end of rush hour.
Drivers said they were striking because even though they paid membership fees to the South African Transport and Allied Workers Union (Satawu), the union was not properly recognised by their employer, so they could not benefit from its protection.
The drivers’ other grievances, such as bad working conditions and poor salaries, would be addressed once their union was properly recognised, they said.
Driver Kervin Lingeveldt, who is also a shop steward for the unionised drivers, said he hoped commuters would support the drivers in their struggle.
“We apologise for the inconvenience, but people must know the pain of what we go through,” he said. “We work long hours, we have less than eight hours to go home and spend time with our families, but at the end of the day our pockets stay empty.”
Service was not badly disrupted, as buses ran at 30-minute intervals on affected routes, making rush hour slower, but not unbearable for commuters.
Lingeveldt said Transpeninsula was blocking Satawu’s organisational rights in a power play.
“They don’t want the union in because the union is powerful,” he said. “They have deducted R90 subscription fee every month for six months now, but the union remains unrecognised.”
Transpeninsula chief executive Ghaalid Behardien said his company had nothing to hide, and that the strike was a result of the union being greedy for members and their fees. Behardien said he had no problem with the drivers being unionised.
“We actually promote them belonging to a union. If you are able to belong to an organisation that can protect your rights, we are all for that.”
However, Behardien said, Satawu was demanding to be the only union Transpeninsula employees could belong to, because it wanted all their subscription fees.
“What Satawu wants is for everyone to belong to them. They want us to sign a recognition agreement that they are the only union here,” he said. “It’s all about the money.”
Behardien said Satawu had also made an unreasonable demand that there must be six shop stewards, with each entitled to 20 days additional paid leave so that they could attend to union affairs.
“In order to avert the strike and inconvenience all the passengers, we came to the table with seven days. They walked away from it,” he said. “I’m not the one who walked away from the negotiation table.”
But Lingeveldt said the frustrated drivers would continue to strike until the recognition had been signed.
“We are prepared to wait for management to come to the party,” he said. “The minute they sign the recognition, we will go back to work.”
Routes that continue to be affected are:
- 01 (Airport, Civic Centre)
- T01 (Dunoon, Table View, Civic Centre, Waterfront)
- 101 (Vredehoek, Gardens, Civic Centre)
- 102 (Salt River Rail, Walmer Estate, Civic Centre)
- 103 (Oranjezicht, Gardens, Civic Centre)
- 105 (Sea Point, Fresnaye, Civic Centre)
- 107 (Civic Centre, Camps Bay)
- 108 (Hangberg, Sea Point, Adderley)
- 108a (Civic Centre, Queens Beach)
- 109 (Hout Bay, Imizamo Yethu, Sea Point, Adderley)
- 110 (Table Mountain)
Cape Argus