Unions – Medupi slowly but surely losing its (man) power
UNIONS have lost control of the workers who are on strike and disrupting the construction of Eskom's urgently-needed power station at Medupi, in Lephalale in the Waterberg District.
LIMPOPO – UNIONS have lost control of the workers who are on strike and disrupting the construction of Eskom’s urgently-needed power station at Medupi, in Lephalale in the Waterberg District.
Construction has been at a standstill for eight weeks now. Among the demands that sparked the latest unprotected stoppages is that all foreign national workers be removed and that preference should be given to local workers. This seemingly xenophobic demand is thought to come from so-called demobilised local workers who have stayed on site in the hope of getting employment. A workers’ forum allegedly driving the demands that started the current stoppage has been talking to labour federation Cosatu’s new metalworkers’ union, the Liberated Metalworkers’ Union of SA (Limusa), because the existing unions don’t take them seriously.
Meanwhile, Eskom believes much of the agitation comes from people who no longer work at Medupi but are holed up in the hostels after being “demobilised”. The workforce at Medupi has shrunk from about 21 000 to 14 000 since 2013 due to a reduced need for those workers attached to completed parts of the project. Eskom’s plan is to clear out the hostels and then screen returning workers to remove not only strikers but the apparently sizable contingent of former workers.
This should take about two weeks, according to Eskom spokesperson Khulu Phasiwe. All workers in the Medupi hostels were asked to take their belongings with them when they left for the long weekend of April 27. Eskom then got an eviction order, allowing it to clear out the workers who had remained. The plan was to allow the workers not involved in the strike to return and to weed out the people who “do not belong” in the hostels in the first place.
Numsa and the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) are fighting the order in court. Numsa’s sector organiser, Steve Nhlapo, said it would be back in court in due course. The current stoppage started with a protest march on March 25, during which workers delivered a memorandum with six demands. According to Phasiwe, there was some uncertainty about who was leading that protest, but “Numsa took ownership of the thing”.
Although the memorandum was signed by Numsa’s regional organiser, Mahlodi Modike, the demands were not solely Numsa’s, but that of “all the unions”, said Nhlapo.
Numsa’s public statements about the demands have been significantly watered down from the original memorandum. The completion bonus of R10 000 being demanded is in addition to 200 hours on normal time to all site employees on their respective rates. Other demands relate more directly to the plight of the demobilised workforce. It is not clear as to how many foreigners were actually working at Medupi.
5000 Medupi workers return to work
Medupi workers still on ‘unprotected strike’
Eskom’s Medupi power station produces its first electricity
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