via Tongaat strike: Govt moves in | The Herald December 19, 2015
Tendai Mugabe in CHIREDZI
Government has intervened in the three week salary dispute between Tongaat Hulett and its workers to avert a possible sugar shortage whose effects are already being felt in some parts of the country. A meeting was held this week between Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare Minister Prisca Mupfumira and lawyers representing the workers and Tongaat Hulett management, where it was resolved that the strike should be stopped forthwith and the $10 increment offered by the company should be accepted as the minimum offer while negotiations continue.
This position was, however, met with stiff resistance by the more than 10 000 Tongaat Hulett employees gathered at the company’s Hippo Mill in Chiredzi yesterday. The workers who are demanding a minimum wage of $300 up from $173, argued that their lawyer, Mr Paul Mangwana, erred by signing the $10 agreement without consulting them. They demanded that Minister Mupfumira and the company management led by Mr Sydney Mutsambiwa should address them.
Government position on the matter was announced by the Zimbabwe Sugar Milling Industry Workers Union president Mr Freedom Madungwe.
Mr Madungwe suffered verbal abuse from his workmates who accused him of selling out their struggle. A letter dated December 16, 2015 signed by Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare secretary (Mr Ngoni Masoka) read by Mr Madungwe to the workers yesterday said: “The Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare has been seized with this matter.
“The employer in his letter dated December 15, 2015, offered $10 as maximum wage increase. The employees, however, demanded $10 as the minimum offer subject to further negotiations. This is what has been agreed following the intervention of this Ministry.
“It was the Ministry’s understanding in terms of our intervention, that the $10 was a minimum rather than a maximum. It is only appropriate that your (employer) offer letter reflects that position — that is this offer is only an initial offer which should be followed by a stoppage of the strike. Negotiations can then resume when the situation has gone back to normal.”
Through its lawyers Scanlen and Holderness, Tongaat Hulett management was agreeable to the arrangement. “Our clients, given the circumstances surrounding this matter, are agreeable to the proposal mentioned in paragraph 5,” reads part of the letter from Scanlen and Holderness.
“Thereafter the parties will immediately resume the due processes.”
However, some of the workers who spoke to the Herald were adamant that they would only return to work after their demands were met. “We are not demanding too much. What we are simply saying is give us wages comparable to our sister companies in South Africa, Mozambique and Swaziland,” said one of the workers who refused to be named.
Another worker who also refused to be named said: “We are suspecting that money has exchanged hands in the line of negotiations. Why is it that after we had agreed that all the negotiations and agreements will be done and signed here our lawyer (Mr Mangan Mangwana) then go and sign agreements in the absence of our union president?
“Our strike should continue and it is still legal because we don’t recognise an agreement that was signed in the absence of (union) president.” Meanwhile, Mr Madungwe said workers resumed work yesterday following an assurance letter from the minister.
He said the second round of negotiations would start on Monday.
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