Fuel strike negotiations falter

Johannesburg - Negotiations between unions and petroleum companies ended in a stalemate on Friday, but employers said over the weekend they were willing to return to negotiations ?as soon as possible?.

Employer members of Sapia (South African Petroleum Industry Association) on Saturday disputed a media statement by Ceppwawu (the Chemical, Energy, Paper, Printing, Wood and Allied Workers Union), that the petroleum companies had walked out of the meeting.

Both parties agreed that they had reached a stalemate in the negotiations, the employers said.

As long as the strike continues, non-working union members will not get paid. We want to urge unions to resume negotiations for the sake of their members. We are anxious to get to a resolution - for the sake of our employees and the general public,? said Avhapfani Tshifularo, executive director of Sapia.

Sapia and its member companies have indicated a strong willingness to return negotiations as soon as possible, even on the weekend if necessary. However, no further negotiations had been reported on Sunday morning.

The unions' demands are an 11%-13% pay rise across the board, a minimum wage of R6 000 per month and a ban on labour brokers. Ceppwawu earlier this week rejected petroleum employers' revised offer of 8% across the board from 7%.

Reports prior to the current deadlock were that fuel supplies were slowly improving as some workers began returning to work.

The National Union of Metalworkers (NUM) kicked off strike season three weeks ago on Monday July 4 and an increase of 8%-10% has been agreed upon which would run for the next year. Ceppwawu, as well as the General Industries Workers Union of SA (Giwusa), who together represent about 70 000 workers, began strike action two weeks ago, also demanding better wages and employee benefits.

The three week strike mark is seen as a tipping point for the strikers themselves, according to BusinessLIVE/I-Net Bridge research, as strikers lose about 2% of their income every week, based on 50 working weeks in a year. They can only afford to strike as long as they are assured the lost income will be made up by the final increased amount.