[miningmx.com] – THERE has never – not even in the Eighties with the emergence of the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) – been so much depression over wage negotiations as there is this year.
The latest news – a two-day wildcat strike at Lonmin and NUM’s ridiculous wage demands for increases of up to 60% submitted to the Chamber of Mines – again confirm everyone’s worst fears: that mineworkers are out to plunder the industry, that the industry is on its last legs, and that the competition for members between NUM and Amcu will be the last straw that will cause the industry to collapse.
The events over the past year – first the violent strike at Impala Platinum’s Rustenburg mines from February to April last year, then the Marikana massacre at Lonmin, immediately followed by protracted strikes, first at Lonmin, then at Anglo American Platinum (Amplats) and then sporadically strikes at gold mines – were seen by all as a prelude to what awaits the industry this year.
The violence accompanying all this has created the expectation for everybody that things will be even worse this year, especially if the wage negotiations at platinum mines lead to strikes.
Perhaps they will, but there are a few misconceptions floating around that may be making the picture look darker than it really is.
One is that Amcu is the cause of all the violence, and that this union’s support is built on intimidation. And top officials in the mining industry hold this opinion. They are in fact very outspoken about it.
Underground job category miners can not read or write, and many do not even know English or Afrikaans. They are extremely dependent on their union – even childishly so. When the union lets them down, it’s a very emotional thing.
And among these people, violence is nothing strange, especially when they live in the kind squatter camp communities that have sprung up around the platinum mines since their hostel accommodation was discontinued and they started getting living-out allowances instead.
To expect a swing in union membership in these communities without intimidation and often violence would be naive. In fact, it’s amazing that mining executives have so little understanding of the conditions and quality of life of the people who work for them.
Implats was the first to recognise Amcu. The union now represents about 60% of the approximately 28,000 workers at Impala Platinum’s Rustenburg mines. The recognition was granted at the end of last year, although no recognition agreement has been signed yet.
The fact is that violence at Implats ceased almost immediately after Amcu was formally recognised.
The hitch at Lonmin is that NUM still occupies offices at that mine, while 74% of Lonmin’s workforce are now Amcu members. That was also the reason for the two-day wildcat strike at Lonmin last week.
It’s also significant that the strike at Lonmin did not extend to Amplats, where renegade worker committees waged a reign of terror during the strikes last year.
Amplats has since hastily signed a formal recognition agreement with Amcu.
The worker committees were busy last week and threatened to strike over the coming job cuts at Amplats, but Amcu nipped that in the bud. This should tell observers a great deal.
Another fallacy is that Amcu’s popularity is just a passing fad that will fade as quickly as it started. This is exactly what happened with the Mouthpiece Workers Union in the Nineties after an equally bloody expulsion of NUM.
There is a big difference between Amcu and the then Mouthpiece. Amcu has been in existence for 10 years in a space where NUM and various employers colluded in all sorts of ways, often in an underhand way, to make things very difficult for it.
That it survived for so long in such circumstances should make it clear that it is a young union, but that it gained valuable experience and learned from it. It will not simply disappear.
Yes, the profile of mineworkers has changed. They are younger and have no ideological loyalty to unions as the older generation have to the struggle stalwart, NUM.
Amcu will have to deliver if it wants to retain their loyalty. And what else can it deliver than fat increases – even more than the 60% that NUM is now demanding from the gold mines?
That’s the obvious solution, except that the mines can’t afford it. If one wants to be honest, one should rather look at ways of improving the quality of life of the miners. This does not necessarily mean cash.
Accommodation, running water, schools, roads and health services. Debt relief ….
There is little basic difference between mining companies and construction companies. The main difference is probably that mining companies mostly are large landowners too.
There is good reason to think that mining companies can do much more for their workers than give them more cash when they line up for their wages at the gate at the end of each week. The moneylenders are usually waiting for them outside the gate.
Labour relations in South Africa are unfortunately always operated in hard cash. This can be changed if people saw reason and were willing to change, but it’s difficult.
This year the conditions for such a change are better than they have ever been before. All it would take is a slight shift in mindset on both sides of the negotiating table.
