Protest tackles Transnet over foreign labour
Protestors marched to hold Transnet accountable for hiring foreign labour instead of local.
UNEMPLOYED labourers from South Durban took to the streets yesterday, 31 March to protest against Transnet’s use of foreign labour instead of the pool of local, skilled artisans.
Hundreds of protestors gathered and commanded Transnet to rework their current operating systems to provide much-needed jobs for the local community. Their missive included the following demands:
* Local companies must be contracted and not foreign companies at the expense of local labour supply.
* A survey must be conducted to determine how much of the labour force is from within Durban, compared to without and how this is detrimental to the local skilled labour force.
* As a state-owned company, Transnet’s moral and constitutional obligation should ensure the nature of the companies and employees hired reflects the government’s message of alleviating unemployment.
* Where skills are local in the local labour force, proper skills transfer programmes should be implemented with specific timeframes in training centres and not on site, at the expense of labourers.
“We are not against foreign labour, as many of our countrymen work in other countries. What we are against is cheap foreign labour replacing local community workers from the Bluff, Wentworth, Merebank, Isipingo, Lamontville, Umlazi and surrounds,” said Frank Alexander of the Metal Engineering Plant and Allied Workers Union (Mephawu).
