JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) on Wednesday marched to Impala Refining Services’ Springs branch, a division of JSE-listed Impala Platinum, to hand over a memorandum demanding better working conditions for its members.

In the memorandum, the union raised various issues to do with the way in which the refinery was being operated, claiming that some employees had been unfairly promoted above other employees to participate in supervisor training, as well as citing a lack of black managers in strategic positions.

Further, the union said one of its members had been “isolated, victimised and dismissed because he is vocal about transformation and issues of [employment equity]. Hence his presence in the transformation committee threatened management from doing as they wish. And thus [they] decided to dismiss him because he was disputing two senior management positions”.

The NUM was demanding that the employee’s case be reviewed and he be reinstated.

Meanwhile, the union also called on management to “respect and honour” the union’s recognition agreement protocol and said the company should not approach the union’s members without consulting the NUM leadership.

Further, the NUM stated that the refinery’s management had not “shown any interest” in transformation.

“Safety, health, environmental and quality management is still lily white, [precious metals refinery] process and engineering management is still lily white, and [the refinery’s] security management is also lily white,” the NUM said, stating that it was not aware of a strategy to counter the lack of transformation.

“Management is silent even in addressing the issue of employment equity in [the] aforementioned plants or sections. They only ensure that black managers are put to manage ‘black trouble’. We therefore demand to see black managers (men and women) in strategic positions where they make decisions instead of ‘yes men and women’,” the union said.

The NUM further demanded that it be included in the decision-making process relating to succession and transformation.

The union demanded that refinery GM Scott Stevenson respond to the memorandum within seven days.