South African Broadcasting Cooperation employees affiliated to the Communication Workers Union (CWU) have been urged to hold their horses until an agreement has been reached with the parastatal's executives.
This was revealed by CWU's general secretary Aubrey Tshabalala after hundreds of SABC employees affiliated to the Broadcasting‚ Electronic‚ Media and Allied Workers Union (Bemawu) took to the streets this morning demanding a 10% salary increment across the board.
Tshabalala said the state entity's management had requested CWU to put the strike on hold as they intend reaching an agreement at the end of their two-day meeting‚ which commenced on Thursday. CWU and Bemawu issued the public broadcaster with a 48-hour strike notice on Monday after failing to form a united front.
"After consultation with our legal advisors we then withdrew the notice to strike with an intention to address those legal technicalities and serve the company should we fail to reach an agreement on said demands. We are still calling [upon] all our members at SABC to be 'combat ready' should negotiations fail‚" said Tshabalala on Thursday.
His plea to more than 1,500 members comes as leadership of the union and the SABC were locked in a meeting at the parastatal's headquarters in Auckland Park‚ Johannesburg‚ on Thursday trying to reach an agreement after wage negotiations collapsed between both unions and management on Wednesday after employees were told there is no financial capacity for salary increases.
"The SABC ... wrote a counter letter to us and Bemawu‚ raising a number of technicalities in relation to the 48-hour notice (intention to strike) and threatened to approach the Labour Court for an interdict. At the same time they proposed to re-open negotiations on the November 1 2017‚" said Tshabalala.
According to the secretary general‚ the CWU is the only union that has obtained a certificate at the Commission of Conciliation‚ Mitigation and Arbitration (CCMA) with an intention to strike and therefore Bemawu's protest action was unprotected.
CWU is demanding a 15% salary increase but are open to lowering their demand if need be. Tshabalala said a 0% salary increase would however not be accepted by the union.
He said the current financial woes at the SABC are not a result of workers in the bargaining unit but are structural and maladministration issues for which "the executive and the state should be held accountable".
Contacted for comment‚ Bemawu's shop steward Charles Cicero said their protest was protected and would inform TimesLIVE about the outcome of the meeting.
"We are currently busy with the mediation process and we will inform you later about the outcomes‚" said Cicero.
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