Numsa threatens secondary strike if agreement not reached
The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) has rejected the latest wage offer by employers in the metals and engineering sector.
The strike by the union, which has some 14 0000 members, will continue after it rejected employer organisations’ revised wage offer.
Irvin Jim, general-secretary of Numsa, said during a media briefing on Thursday the offer given by employer federations, including the Steel and Engineering Industry Federation of South Africa (Seifsa) and the National Employers Association of South Africa (Neasa), amounted to a wage increase of 4.28%.
“The ANC-led government failed to impose a meaningful national minimum wage instead what they, by imposing a slavery national minimum wage of R21 an hour, was to give free ammunition to ruthless organisations such as Neasa and Seifsa who deliberately sabotage and block workers wage increase.
“The recommended increase will be based on the actual rates of pay an employee is earning in any particular workplace. There is basically no offer there, the union cannot take this nonsense to the workers,” said Jim.
He added that if the employer associations do not come to the table, they leave the union with no choice but issues a secondary strike notice which he vows will to collapse the rest of the economy.
Numsa is demanding an increase of 8%.
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