JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – There would be no need for forced retrenchments at Anglo American Platinum’s (Amplats’) mines, should the issue of labour hire contractors be dealt with, Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU) president Joseph Mathunjwa said on Monday.

Speaking at a media briefing in Johannesburg to discuss the ongoing strike by AMCU members at Amplats’ operations, Mathunjwa said the union would continue with its protected strike until a final resolution had been reached, adding that its members continued to hold that retrenchment had to be a last resort after all other options had been explored.

AMCU members embarked on a protected strike at Amplats on September 27 in protest over the platinum miner’s plans to retrench 3 300 workers as part of a restructuring drive.

Discussions between the union and Amplats were ongoing.

“One of the sticking points in the draft agreement with Amplats is the issue of retrenching permanent employees, while the company still engages volumes of labour hire contractors, who are performing core functions that our members can perform,” Mathunjwa said.

He stated that AMCU’s observation on the position of Amplats was that it was intending to implement what he called "International Monetary Fund policies" and the National Development Plan, which he said promoted the concept of labour hire and limited-duration contract workers, as these workers were cheap labour without benefits, who could be dismissed with no recourse as a result of the nature of the contractual agreements. 

Mathunjwa said that, at Amplats, employees that would be affected by the retrenchments could be redeployed in positions currently occupied by contractors. For example, current qualified protection services employees could be redeployed where contracted security companies were operating.

“Other areas where labour hire contractors currently operate include mining activities such as diamond drilling, belt attendance, lamp room attendance, secondary support, grout packing, pipe repairs, the issuing of personal protective equipment and pipe tracking and ventilation,” he pointed out.

Mathunjwa reiterated that Amplats had not fully explored the range of jobs that could be undertaken by those employees facing retrenchment.

“Therefore, AMCU proposes that, as part of the agreement, there shall be no employee who is terminated while there are labour hire contractors performing core functions,” he noted.

He added that the union had written to Public Protector Thuli Madonsela asking for an investigation into the labour hire environment at Amplats to find out why the platinum miner was willing to go to such great lengths to protect its contractors at the expense of its permanent employees.

Meanwhile, Mathunjwa said another area of the draft agreement with which AMCU disagreed pertained to the 1 248 people, of the 3 300 employees that would be retrenched, that Amplats wanted to retain for a further six months to do reclamation and vamping work.

“AMCU wants these employees to remain as permanent workers until their termination date. During the period of reclamation and vamping work, these employees should then be considered for redeployment into vacancies arising from natural attrition and the termination of the contracts of nonspecialised contractors.”

Where reskilling was needed for such redeployment, the union wanted Amplats to commit to retraining employees for such positions to make them eligible for redeployment, said Mathunjwa, adding that, in the event that some of the employees could not be redeployed, they should be eligible for voluntary severance packages.

Further, he noted that, while the strike continued, AMCU remained committed to further engagement with Amplats to resolve the differences.

He added that the union would await the outcome of an investigation on current contractors performing core functions at Amplats’ mines and was willing to further engage on alternatives for retrenchment based on this outcome.

AMCU also urged Amplats to suspend the termination of affected employees who had already been issued with notices for employment termination until the engagements with the union had been completed.

Amplats told Mining Weekly Online that it was preparing a statement in which it would respond to the issues raised.

Mathunjwa further said that, should it come to light that the strike was being prolonged by the mining company as a means to pressure union members and divide the union, AMCU would consider embarking on a secondary strike, at other mines and across other sectors to support the cause.

Amplats last week reported that the industrial action was costing the company about 3 100 oz/d of production.