JSE-listed Telkom would progress with the implementation of a three-year wage agreement after securing the signature of the second-largest trade union at the telecommunications firm, the South African Communications Union (Sacu), on Monday.

Sacu president Michael Hare said that after “rollercoaster wage negotiations” wherein offers were tabled, retracted and changed several times, the parties had finally settled and were confident that the terms of the agreement would be implemented.

Telkom last week reached an agreement with its largest union, the Communication Workers Union (CWU), after months-long negotiations and disagreements over the future remuneration of its bargaining unit employees.

Following the conclusion of the two agreements, Telkom aimed to implement the wage deal across its bargaining unit on Wednesday, CEO Sipho Maseko said at a media briefing.

But the firm had yet to cement the arrangement with its third union, Solidarity, which had been publicly disputing the resolution of the wage agreement.

Solidarity spokesperson Marius Croucamp said that the union indicated its agreement with the unilateral implementation of the agreement, but would reserve its right to dispute any disparities over the next three years – a right, he said, the other unions had relinquished through signing the agreement.

Solidarity remained opposed to the agreement, saying that while they applaud Telkom’s efforts to rectify inequalities within the group, the firm’s approach was likely to result in an exodus of skilled employees and general discontent among employees.

According to Telkom, the multiyear agreement outlined that a 6% general salary hike would be applied to the market’s fiftieth percentile as per employee functional area, while employees below the fiftieth percentile would receive an additional amount added to their total package.

This meant that, in moving towards equitable remuneration, about 1 700 employees would not receive direct wage adjustments, but would receive a monthly pensionable one-off amount, while the remaining 16 800 workers would directly receive wage adjustments during the first year.

Croucamp stated that it was a discriminatory model and would likely alienate the company’s highly skilled and trained labour as it capped their salaries and brought up unskilled labour wages on par with theirs, creating new anomalies.

“We won’t deny our members an increase, but we believe that there should be an inflation-linked 6% across-the-board hike,” he said, adding that Telkom should rather correct the historical disparity separately over and above the increase.

The wage agreement was effective April 1, 2013, when the previous wage period ended, and extended until March 31, 2016.