Engineering sector faces strike threat

THE engineering sector could be brought to its knees if a planned strike by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) goes ahead.

The workers can go on a national strike within the next 48 hours if the biggest union in the sector does not agree with employers after Numsa was granted a strike certificate.

Numsa spokeswoman Pakamile Hlubi said the union was engaging its members and preparing them for the “no work no pay strike”.

The certificate was issued after the union and sector employers’ minimum wage negotiations reached a stalemate last month.

In the Eastern Cape some of the major employers that will be affected include Defy, Schnellecke SA, Millberg Manufacturing, Magneto Wheels and InfraStructural Works.

Employer organisations at the negotiations were the Fuel Retailers Association and National Employers’Association of South Africa, while the two unions were Numsa and the Motor Industry Staff Association.

Numsa, which is the biggest union with more than 29 000 members, described the wage proposal by sector employers as a “poverty wage”.

South African Engineers and Founders Association (Saefa) executive director Gordon Angus said the move by the union was not unexpected, but “entirely unnecessary”.

“Saefa has been aware of Numsa’s apparent desire to initiate strike action, seemingly at any cost,” Angus said, adding that this was: “evidenced by their unwillingness to participate meaningfully in any of the dispute meetings thus far”.

Angus said while the other unions involved in the negotiations had made attempts to counter the offers put on the table by employers in the sector, Numsa had not contributed to any of the discussions, choosing rather to stick resolutely to its initial demands.

“To reach a successful conclusion, any negotiation process requires a measure of give-andtake from all parties,” Angus emphasised.

“But the counter-offers presented by the various unions barely changed from the initial demands – with Numsa not changing at all – with the ongoing insistence that wages must increase by an amount that is almost triple the current inflation figure,” said Angus.

The last big engineering sector strike, in 2013, halted production at vehicle manufacturing plants because of a shortage of automotive components.