Eskom tables 4.7% wage offer - Numsa

Negotiations between the power utility and Numsa, as well as the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and Solidarity restarted in Johannesburg on Tuesday.

Eskom earlier pleaded poverty and told unions that is cannot afford to grant wage increases this year. 

But it was forced back to the negotiation table after unions engaged in wildcat strikes at several of the utility's power stations.

Eskom claims the strikes had an serious effect on its operations which resulted in the load shedding the country is currently experiencing.

 Numsa's Irvin Jim says Eskom has put a four-year deal in the table.

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 "As unions we have not committed on anything on that, we are going back to our constituencies and reflect tonight.

"We will communicate a joint position of all the three unions tomorrow and negotiations should resume,” Jim told reporters.  

"We are calling on Eskom board and the management to come to the party and be part of this process, let's have people who are part of this process who have capacity to take decisions if we are to take new grounds".

While there are growing concerns of more job losses should Eskom implement a salary increase, Jim believes workers should not pay for decisions taken by management.

"We have maintained a very consistent position that we will reject this. Workers will not be the ones who are being targeted. There is a bloated executives of Eskom which is a big issue.

"There is a reckless decision on IPPs that are destroying the Eskom market and there is an issue of primary coal which we say must be debated. If all those issues are fixed, then Eskom will be on its way to being viable.”