BusinessLive reports that urgent applications lodged in court by 15 mining companies to prevent Thursday’s seven-day secondary mining strikes called by the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu) might stop the action before it starts.
The secondary strikes are an attempt by Amcu to force an end to the protracted strike at Sibanye-Stillwater’s gold mines and is seen by industry players as a high-stake effort by the union’s president Joseph Mathunjwa to show his power. Amcu has issued notices to 15 gold and platinum mines, including AngloGold Ashanti, Harmony Gold, Impala Platinum, Northam and Glencore, warning of a secondary strike from 28 February to 7 March. Mining companies will argue in the labour court that a secondary strike can only be called if there is a direct link between the primary employer or company and those at which the secondary strike has been called, which in these cases they claim does not exist. Applications for an urgent decision were lodged on Friday with more expected on Monday and Tuesday. Amcu has entered the fourth month of a wage strike at Sibanye’s three large gold mines, with 14,000 workers unpaid in a protected strike started by the union on 21 November to demand annual R1,000/month salary increases.
- Read the original of Allan Seccombe’s report on the above in full at BusinessLive
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