You+guard+millions+but+are+paid+peanuts,+Nzimande,+B+Day

Business Day, Johannesburg,, 12 April 2006
=‘You guard millions but are paid peanuts’=


 * SAPA**

THE South African Communist Party (SACP) has pledged support for a security guards’ strike, saying as workers they helped liberate SA and deserved to benefit from “the fruits of its democracy”.

Blade Nzimande, SACP general secretary, yesterday told striking security workers in Johannesburg that the struggle was difficult because South Africans lived under capitalism.

“You guard millions, but you are paid peanuts,” he told members of South African Transport Workers’ Union (Satawu) at Beyers Naude Square.

Nzimande said the SACP expressed its solidarity with the workers’ aspirations.

Unlike last week’s marches, which were characterised by violence, yesterday’s protest was peaceful, with no reports of intimidation of nonstriking guards.

After being updated on the events of the weekend, when a court ruled in their favour by endorsing the legitimacy of their strike, the strikers left for Johannesburg’s Park Station to catch a train to Springbok Fidelity’s offices in Robertville.

Satawu national co-ordinator of security Simon Jackson said the Labour Court on Saturday set aside an interim interdict declaring Satawu’s strike illegal and unprotected after five employer associations and 14 other unions signed a wage deal on April 1.

The court ruled that the wage agreement was not legally binding because Satawu was not part of it. It also found that Satawu had an effective veto under an agreement entered into at the beginning of wage negotiations.

Employers and the other 14 trade unions agreed to a 26% increase in benefits over a three-year period, with an average increase of 8% a year.

Satawu is demanding an 11% pay increase and improved working conditions.

The trade union has announced an indefinite second wave of protest action starting today, with a national strike planned for April 26.


 * Sapa**


 * From: http://www.businessday.co.za/articles/national.aspx?ID=BD4A184972**

301 words