Labour unrest in the South African Post Office
10 October 2014
The Communication Workers Union (CWU) is surprised by the Minister of Telecommunications and Postal Services' call to CWU to suspend the strike that has been going on in the South African Post Office for almost two weeks because as CWU we have not called for any strike.
We were further taken aback by the initiative of the company and other groupings under the auspices of the Department of Telecommunications and Postal Services to call off the strike and agreed on the proposal made by the company without consultation with the workers. This approach has worsened or deepened the crisis in the company. Our view as CWU is that it is workers that must give us a mandate on whether the deal of conversion of workers to permanent in stages and salary increase is worth considering or not.
Four of our provinces have so far rejected the proposal of the company. We hope to receive the feedback from the remaining five provinces by close of business today.
We remain firm in our call for dissolution of the board and expulsion of the current executive management and further make a call to National Treasury to bail out the South African Post Office for the purpose of refurbishing infrastructure and creating of sustainable and decent employment.
Retrenchments and Employment Equity in Telkom
We are surprised to find out that Telkom has already issued retrenchment letters to 105 management staff who they claim were affected by Section 189 of the Labour Relations Act. This was surprising to us as Telkom had reported that 302 management staff had taken voluntary severance packages and others had taken voluntary retirement package. The target that Telkom wanted to achieve was 223 which meant that with 302 having been allowed to exit through severance packages they had over achieved their target of 223, secondly there were still 168 vacancies available yet Telkom had issued these 105 managers with letters of forceful retrenchment.
We demand that Telkom should retract the retrenchment letters and place these management staff as 168 positions still available. We have been raising concerns with the current CEO, Mr Sipho Maseko and his team around a number of issues as indicated below:
While his predecessors have been trying to reduce the salary gap between management and bargaining unit staff they have actually widened the gap between the lowest paid and the highest paid by giving management a 6% salary increase the same as bargaining union;
While the CEO and his top management staff were paid a large gain sharing bonus, above R5m, he has failed to honour an agreement that stipulate how gain sharing will be paid for employees in the bargaining unit;
Our agreement to convert labour brokers to permanent positions has been stopped and these workers have been retrenched and this is still continuing;
Victimisation of shopstewards has become the order of the day using performance and development management system;
Gains made by the current management's predecessors on employment equity are being eroded as they are employing whites in the majority and people from Vodacom;
It has also come to our attention that Sipho Maseko is planning to outsource the Call Centre and Telkom Direct Shops and many others are in the pipeline and this we will never allow. We will never allow this top management to collapse Telkom. They have declared war and we are ready for it;
With the current process of retrenchment of management staff in all divisions, the majority of positions that are not affected are those of whites while the Black majority is being retrenched. Those who are lucky to make the cut are misplaced in favour of his white staff;
Based on the above, we view Telkom management and in particular the CEO, Sipho Maseko, as a person who is in total disregard of both the Employment Equity Act and the Labour Relations Act. We cannot work with such a person and therefore call for his resignation.
Reflection on Unity of COSATU
As we are preparing for the COSATU Central Executive Committee meeting to be held on the 14th October 2014, CWU notes and welcome Secretariat Report to be presented as a true reflection of the current state of the federation. Our consistent call for a Special National Congress was not an accident of history, but an outcome of our analysis that federation is in a state of paralysis. We felt that there was no need for public spats amongst affiliates in COSATU but to engage in building COSATU through a proper structure which is a National Congress. We are now waiting in anticipation of the report that will be presented by the ANC Task Team led by Deputy President Cde Cyril Ramaphosa and we hope that the report wouldn't undermine the founding principle of the federation with regards to worker control and democratic processes of the federation.
Statement issued by Aubrey Tshabalala, Communication Workers Union General Secretary, October 10 2014
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