Today's Labour News

OCCUPATIONAL SAFETY

Ekurhuleni employees fear returning to their posts after KwaThemba building attacked, cars torched over electricity supply

News24 reports that City of Ekurhuleni employees in KwaThema are afraid to return to their posts after an attack on their offices by residents. The customer care centre was attacked on Wednesday by angry residents, who were demanding electricity. The protesters hurled stones and bricks at the Ekurhuleni municipal building and torched two vehicles. Ekurhuleni metro police officers were deployed to the facility. On Thursday morning, some workers stood outside the facility, while others remained inside their vehicles. Inside the facility, remnants of two torched municipal vehicles could be seen in the parking lot. Some windows were shattered. An employee, who refused to be identified, said she was afraid to return to her post. “Something must be done. Our lives are at stake. The municipality must fix the electricity matter quickly before things get out of hand.   I wonder what they were thinking by attacking the building. We don't provide electricity. Ours is to do administration work only,” she indicated. Ekurhuleni's spokesperson, Zweli Mnisi, condemned the incident and said: "Employees are afraid to work. Their safety can't be guaranteed. We are working hard to ensure that electricity is restored in the entire KwaThema. Some sections have electricity, and we hope that power will be fully restored very soon." He advised that the customer care centre remained closed.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Ntwaagae Seleka at News24

ELECTRICITY CRISIS / LOAD-SHEDDING

Electricity minister’s new powers are minimal, analysts reckon

Mail & Guardian reports that the transfer of competencies from Mineral Resources and Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe to Electricity Minister Kgosientsho Ramokgopa was three months in the making, but analysts say that, in the end, the latter was given few meaningful powers. According to a government gazette published last Friday, the powers and functions assigned in terms of section 34(1) of the Electricity Regulation Act were immediately shifted to the electricity minister, a new portfolio Ramaphosa announced in his state of the nation address. Section 34(1)(b) empowers him to decide that there is a need for new generation capacity to ensure uninterrupted power supply and to determine the generational sources and mix required to keep the lights on. But these decisions feed into the Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), which sets out the basis for new procurement. It has to date been the responsibility of the energy minister and Mantashe has been overseeing an update of the 2019 IRP.   Anton Eberhard of UCT said a close reading of section 34 made plain that Ramokgopa had been allocated “nothing meaningful” in the division of powers between the energy and electricity portfolios. “Mantashe has already made nearly all the determinations for the next few years and tellingly he has retained control over the procurement process,” he pointed out. Energy analyst Chris Yelland noted that Ramokgopa had no executive authority regarding Eskom: “He is not a member of the board, he’s not the chairman, he is not the minister of Eskom, so as far I can see, Ramokgopa has got nothing.” One could surmise, Yelland added, that the minister’s main responsibility was chairing the National Energy Crisis Committee and driving the implementation of the Energy Action Plan the president announced last July.

Read the full original of the informative report in the above regard by Emsie Ferreira at Mail & Guardian (subscriber access only). Read too, Mantashe asked Ramaphosa not to give all his powers to electricity minister, at Mail & Guardian (subscriber access only)

Ramaphosa joins appeal application against order to shield hospitals, schools and police stations from load-shedding

Fin24 reports that President Cyril Ramaphosa has joined Public Enterprises Minister Pravin Gordhan in applying for leave to appeal a court order issued in May that all hospitals, clinics, schools and police stations should be spared from electricity disruptions. Judge Norman Davis ordered the minister to "take all reasonable steps" within 60 days to ensure that public health establishments, state schools and the SA Police Service were not affected by load shedding. This came after the United Democratic Movement (UDM), Inkatha Freedom Party, Action SA, the National Union of Metalworkers and other organisations launched a legal bid to spare hospitals and clinics, 23,000 public schools and police stations from load shedding. Gordhan is the second respondent, alongside Eskom, the National Energy Regulator of SA and others. Ramaphosa is the fourth respondent and the government of SA is the eighth respondent. A joint notice of application for leave to appeal was filed on behalf of Ramaphosa and the government of SA on Thursday. Gordhan filed on Tuesday. The respondents wish to appeal to the Supreme Court of Appeal on four grounds, namely that the order is vague; that it is impossible to implement; that it "violates the rule of law"; and that it infringes on the principle of separation of powers. The applicants argue that the "far-reaching order" will require "drastically” rearranging the state's budget, and doing so within 60 days is not feasible. The notice of leave to appeal relates to part A of the case. The UDM and others also want the court to issue an order to hold President Cyril Ramaphosa legally responsible for the human cost of load-shedding. Part B is set to be heard in September.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard compiled by Marelise van der Merwe at Fin24. Read too, Government working to shield hospitals from load shedding, says Ramokgopa, at The Citizen

POLICING

Policing union calls on chief of police Fannie Masemola to be fired over ‘inability’ to fight crime

TimesLIVE reports that the SA Policing Union (Sapu) has called for President Cyril Ramaphosa to fire national police commissioner Gen Fannie Masemola over his “inability” to fight high levels of crime.   The call came after the latest statistics showed a spike in serious crime, with 6,289 people killed from January to March, a 3.4% increase compared to the same period in 2022.   The union has repeatedly called for the re-establishment of specialised units, saying a focused approach was needed to target serious and violent crimes. “It was agreed upon during 2020 … that specialised units will be re-established. In the current tenure of Masemola, we made this call and further proposals on the re-establishment. Unfortunately, he does not want to listen, yet he is failing,” said Sapu national spokesperson LesibaThobakgale. He described the release of the crime stats as a publicity stunt, saying no action was taken afterwards. Noting that “everything we propose falls on deaf ears”, the union called for Masemola to “fall on his sword”, adding that he had failed in all aspects of his job, as hundreds of functioning members on the ground had lost confidence in him.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Sakhiseni Nxumalo at BusinessLive

COST OF LIVING / INTEREST RATES

Cosatu to engage Reserve Bank on ‘reckless’ increases in repo rate, with national day of action on 6 July

BL Premium reports that Cosatu has again weighed in on the rising cost of living and has called on the SA Reserve Bank (SARB) to ease rate increases and play a prominent role in addressing the country’s socioeconomic challenges. On 25 May, the SARB raised the repo rate by another 50 basis points to 8.25%, the highest since 2009. The move saw the prime interest rate, which commercial banks use to lend to customers, rising to 11.75%. Cosatu general secretary Solly Phetoe, in a briefing after Thursday’s three-day central executive committee (CEC), said the federation was concerned by the rising cost of living, a stubbornly high 32.9% unemployment rate and entrenched poverty. Interventions were needed to cushion the poor, including increasing the R350 special relief dispensation (SRD) grant to at least R620 and extending it together with the presidential youth employment intervention programme beyond 2024. Phetoe said Cosatu would be ramping up campaigns to help protect the working class from the rising cost of living and poverty, including engaging the SARB “to ease the excessively reckless and suffocating increases in the repo rate”.   The government needed to reduce taxes that constitute 28% of the fuel levy as “the fastest and most effective way to reduce food and transport and other key goods’ prices and thus providing relief to millions and the economy,” Cosatu’s president Zingiswa Losi said. Cosatu will embark on a national day of action on 6 July in defence of collective bargaining and against government corruption, the energy crisis and “exorbitant interest rates”.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Luyolo Mkentane at BusinessLive (subscriber access only)

ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

'Gatvol' organisations protest against illegal immigrants at Union Buildings

TimesLIVE writes that pressure on state resources due an uncontrolled influx of illegal immigrants has resulted in 35 organisations joining forces to demand their mass deportation. During a march to the Union Buildings on Thursday, where they intended handing over a petition to President Cyril Ramaphosa's office, they complained about foreigners overburdening state resources.   Kgothatso Moloto of ‘Voice It In Action’ said: “The taxpayer is dying trying to carry the burden, it's not fair. Illegal immigrants should be deported with immediate effect.   There is no way that in South Africa we can have a lawless country, where the laws of immigration and the laws of employment equity are not followed.” He went on to state: “Our children don't have space at schools because we have foreign nationals who are occupying a lot of spaces in those schools. We are struggling to get medication from clinics and access to hospitals because they are also catering to foreign nationals in South Africa. South Africa is supposed to be catering to its own people.” Rendani Ramashia of ‘Tshwane Bahlali Dudula’ complained about jobs being taken by foreigners and said they wanted the government to address South Africans on a plan of action and way forward to resolve the problem.   David Ratladi of ‘Inwoners Baagi Civic Movement’ claimed that most foreigners were not bringing rare skills into SA.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Shonisani Tshikalange at TimesLIVE

EMPLOYMENT EQUITY LEGISLATION

Solidarity writes to major companies asking them to record their protest against new ‘race law’

Solidarity on Thursday announced that it had written to at least 2,000 of SA’s major companies, asking them to record their protest against the government’s latest race laws.   Companies have been requested to collectively refuse to implement the Employment Equity Amendment Act, which President Ramaphosa signed into law on 12 April 2023, to exert political pressure on the government and to join the trade union’s legal battle.   According to the letter, companies that obey the new legislation will not only be complicit in injustice, but also in the deepening crisis in SA. The letter maintains that companies do not have the right to obey injustice. It also makes the point that the new Act “deprives employers of the right to do business and employees of the right to work”.   Solidarity Chief Executive Dirk Hermann argues in the letter that the onus to stop the Act and the regulations rests largely on businesses.   He also maintains that the regulations make SA the most racially regulated country in the world and put employers in an impossible position because they are unimplementable. The new law and the regulations give the Minister of Employment and Labour the right to identify sectors and to set race quotas for these sectors that can be imposed on employers. The minister has reportedly published 60 pages of regulations prescribing in detail to employers what their race numbers should look like. “Redressing imbalances or creating more jobs is a legitimate goal but the focus is not on redress or jobs but on race – even if it is at the cost of jobs,” Hermann writes.

Read Solidarity’s press statement in the above regard and access the letter to businesses at Solidarity News. Lees ook, Solidariteit vra groot maatskappye se steun teen omstrede ‘raswet’, by Maroela Media

OVERTIME

After seven years of ‘curtailment measures’, Mbombela’s R160m annual overtime bill is still increasing

Mail & Guardian reports that over the past seven years the City of Mbombela has failed to reduce its staggering R160 million annual overtime bill, despite the Mpumalanga municipality having introduced “cost curtailment measures”. Mbombela’s overtime bill for municipal staff peaked at R14 million a month in 2016, with the consistent failure to bring it down sparking concern among opposition parties, who wanted the municipality to fill vacancies and enforce consequence management on errant council departments. In February, opposition parties tried to secure an intervention from Mpumalanga cooperative governance and traditional affairs MEC Mandla Msibi, who faced several questions in the provincial legislature over the debacle. At the time, Msibi said that steps were being taken by the municipality to reduce overtime costs and that consequence management was being implemented against those responsible for driving up the costs. But the bill has still not been reduced and is, according to Mbombela FF+ councillor Ken Robertson, unacceptably increasing, even though not by much. “The overtime bill is still standing at R14 million a month. We have a massive number of vacancies across departments, which contributes heavily to the annual bill. One would think that these would be filled, but they haven’t,” Robertson noted. He added: “A lot has to do with people not doing work during regular hours because they want to work overtime and make extra money. There is poor management and poor monitoring, and the bill hasn’t been reduced at all.” A municipality spokesperson said the overtime issue was “being investigated” and that a report would be tabled before council in due course.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Paddy Harper at Mail & Guardian (subscriber access only)

UNPAID WAGES

Outsourced cleaners hold protest outside Transnet’s Durban offices over unpaid salaries

TimesLIVE reports that outsourced Transnet cleaners engaged in an unprotected strike in Durban over unpaid wages on Thursday.   Workers employed by Masihloniphaneni Trading – a company outsourced by Transnet to provide cleaning services – staged a stay-away on Ely Road in Bayhead, Durban. According to Justice Duma, one of the protesting workers, they had not been paid their May salaries more than a week after their supposed payday, which he said was a regular occurrence. “This is the second month in a row that this has happened to us in this company. Contractually we have to be paid on the 25th, but last month we were paid on the 30th. This time it’s been over a week, but nothing has been communicated to us,” he stated. According to Duma, Masihloniphaneni got the Transnet cleaning tender in April, replacing Hlabane Trading, although the new service provider retained the workers.   Comparing the two, Duma said both companies had been paying them later than the agreed-upon pay date, but the difference was in communication. A Transnet official who met with the workers assured them the problem was not with Masihloniphaneni. He put them on a call with a senior official who confirmed that Transnet had not paid the service provider for the two months. He said the company would release the funds to the service provider on Thursday, but they might not immediately reflect. Satawu’s Jason Kunene said they had asked a manager from Transnet Property to meet with the affected parties within 24 hours to explain what happened and discuss a way forward. Workers agreed to go back to work for the time being.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Lwazi Hlangu at BusinessLive

NATIONAL HEALTH INSURANCE

Association representing medical specialists rejects NHI Bill

BL Premium reports that SA’s key industry association for medical specialists says it does not support the National Health Insurance Bill (NHI), describing it as financially unviable and at odds with the rights of people to choose how and where they obtain healthcare. The SA Private Practitioners Forum (SAPPF) has also raised concerns about the sustainability of the private healthcare sector if, as the bill proposes, the role of medical schemes is sharply curtailed.   Its concerns about the potential effects of the bill echo sentiments expressed earlier this week by SA’s biggest doctor organisation, the SA Medical Association (Sama). The bill is the first piece of enabling legislation for NHI, the government’s plan for universal health coverage, and was approved by parliament’s portfolio committee on health last week without any material changes to the 2019 version. It will now go to the National Assembly for debate, where it is expected to be approved. While the bill still has some way to go before it can be enacted, as it must still be considered by the National Council of Provinces and then sent to the president for assent, its approval by the committee nevertheless marks a key milestone. The SAPPF said the “very minor” changes made to the bill failed to address any of the concerns raised by private healthcare. Section 33 of the bill would sharply pare back the role of medical schemes, limiting them to providing only complementary cover to services not covered by the NHI Fund.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by BusinessLive (subscriber access only)

MISCONDUCT

Probe into ‘babies in boxes’ shows alleged serious misconduct by Mahikeng hospital management, says MEC

News24 report that according to North West Health MEC Madoda Sambatha, a preliminary departmental investigation into babies being placed into cardboard boxes at Mahikeng Provincial Hospital revealed allegations of serious misconduct against hospital management. On Thursday, Sambatha released the preliminary investigation report that was part of a multi-phased approach adopted by the department to resolve the challenges experienced at the hospital.   Last Friday, the department announced it had launched an investigation into babies being placed in cardboard boxes in the hospital's neonatal section. The report has now called for five hospital management members to be temporarily relocated to nearby facilities to allow the investigation to continue unhindered. Sambatha advised: “I have also reviewed my decision about the precautionary suspension of the two officials following the report's release. I have constantly said that the precautionary suspension was never punitive but to give space to ascertain whether their presence would not interfere with the investigation.” He indicated that the department had channelled skills and resources to augment the operational capacity at the hospital for effective service delivery. A space audit had been conducted as part of the intervention, and the postnatal unit would be moved to gynaecology to allow that space to be converted into a neonatal ward to accommodate 79 incubators and cribs.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Yoliswa Sobuwa at News24

WORKPLACE CRIME

Durban domestic worker arrested after 'colluding' with robbers who stole from employer

News24 reports that a domestic worker from Mariannhill in Durban is expected to appear in the Pinetown Magistrate's Court after she was arrested for allegedly aiding two criminals who stole from her employer's home. The 33-year-old woman was arrested for perjury on Tuesday after she opened a "false case of house robbery". Colonel Robert Netshiunda, KwaZulu-Natal police spokesperson, indicated:   "The woman, who is a domestic worker on Amand Road in Mariannhill Park, opened a case of house robbery and told the police that she was hanging clothes on the washing line when she heard a noise coming from inside the house." The woman claimed that when she went to investigate, "she saw a man carrying a TV set" and further claimed that she saw another suspect breaking the driveway gate. She alleged that the man stole jewellery and robbed her of her cellphone before fleeing from the house in a silver vehicle. Netshiunda said CCTV footage from neighbouring houses, however, showed that the woman voluntarily opened the gate for the two suspects, which led to her being charged. The two robbers are still at large.

Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Nkosikhona Duma at News24. Lees ook, Huiswerker vas ná sy glo hek vir ‘rowers’ oopsluit, by Maroela Media

OTHER REPORTS OF INTEREST

• Old Mutual flags possible unrest before next year’s general election, at BusinessLive
• Wetsontwerp oor prostitusie teruggetrek, by Maroela Media
• School-run crackdown: Municipal car seized while dad was taking child to school ‘for the last time’, at IOL