Retrenchments Cause of Mining Strikes in South Africa

Multiple gold strikes by affiliate NUM in South Africa may have been tempered some by a court decree late last week declaring an end to one strike, Gold Fields involving 30,000 miners. But ongoing stoppages and potential strikes could still pull 100,000 NUM members out, shutting down the country’s gold mining industry. On 23 March, 21,000 NUM miners at Harmony Gold’s Free State mines struck after the company reneged on a labour agreement from last summer. Harmony unilaterally terminated that agreement and announced job cuts to 4,900 workers without NUM consultation, thus shredding an understanding between Harmony and NUM reached last July.

The 30,000 Gold Fields miners could return to strike lines once NUM serves a legal notice. A key issue at Gold Fields is housing. The company still provides only common-sex hostels in mining areas, a throwback to apartheid days. Pay disparity between black workers and white workers also is an issue, as is the fact that white women receive maternity leave while black women do not. At the weekend, NUM worksite leaders from South Africa’s other third big gold mining house, AngloGold Ashanti, were meeting to consider their options.