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BusinessLive reports that the interpretation of a law requiring a secret ballot before unions embark on a strike is set to take centre stage in the Labour Court in Johannesburg on Wednesday in a case to prevent a shutdown of the banking sector.
Employer organisation Business Unity SA (Busa) will be seeking to interdict finance union Sasbo, a Cosatu affiliate, from embarking on the planned shutdown on Friday. About 50,000 of the union’s members intend to protest against job losses and retrenchments in the sector. The strike-ballot legislation came into effect on 1 January and unions were given six months to amend their constitutions accordingly. On Monday, the Banking Association SA (Basa) said Busa was seeking to stop the protest as Cosatu’s notice sent to Nedlac in terms of which Sasbo was planning to act “may not have satisfied the requirements for the action to be legally protected”. It argued that the Nedlac notice was issued in August 2017 and should not be relied on in 2019. It also noted that Sasbo had not balloted its members. But, Sasbo general secretary Joe Kokela said the Nedlac notice issued in 2017 was still valid: “You can use the certificate any time you want as long as it has not been enforced. There is no law that says you must use the certificate within a certain period.” He also indicated that the Labour Relations Amendment Act only required the balloting of members when a union intended embarking on a strike under section 64 of the law. “We filed our application under section 77, which deals with protected protest action. If we wanted to go on a strike, we would have filed under section 64,” he pointed out. Sasbo has filed opposing documents in the case.
- Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Luyolo Mkentane at BusinessLive
- Read too, Court on Wednesday can stop Friday’s bank strike, at Engineering News
Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page