ANA reports that the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa) said on Saturday that government and Eskom unions have agreed that wage negotiations be resumed with immediate effect and the zero percent increase proposed by the power utility was “off the table”.  

Numsa met Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan on Friday.  Also present at the meeting were the two other unions represented at Eskom, namely the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and Solidarity, as well as members of the Eskom board and management.  Numsa general secretary Irvin Jim indicated:  “We agreed that without demobilising we shall normalise the situation and give negotiations a chance which will resume this coming Tuesday, [and] to engage in key issues that impact on the future sustainability of Eskom such as coal costs, the impact of policy including IPPs [independent power producers], the cost of primary coal, the bloated top executive structure of Eskom management which is costly, and the building of trustworthy relationships between the parties as part of the process post-negotiations.”  Numsa said it viewed the agreed process of engagement as necessary in resolving the dispute between the unions and Eskom management, and laying the grounds for the negotiations to continue.

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