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The National Union of Mineworkers’ (NUM) general-secretary, David Sipunzi, has suspended 13 members of the NUM South Deep gold mine branch following an attack on its Gauteng regional chair, Ndlela Radebe, last week.
This amid a strike that is already into its sixth week.
In a letter, which City Press has a copy, addressed to South Deep branch chair, Kanetso Matabane, and dated December 6, Sipunzi said that:
“After assessing the situation at South Deep, which has culminated in the attempted murder of the regional chairperson [Radebe] and his bodyguard, the national office bears have taken a decision to invoke the NUM constitution [to suspend 13 members of the NUM South Deep branch],” he added.
South Deep is located west of Johannesburg in Gauteng.
On December 3, according to Fin24, Radebe was stabbed and injured at a mass meeting at the Greenhills Stadium in Randfontein, west of Johannesburg, and was rescued by NUM security.
The attack came after Radebe issued a directive ordering the South Deep branch to end the protracted strike, according to Fin24.
Radebe also wrote that the region had received “countless calls from” concerned NUM members, who believe the industrial action threatens their job security. He added that defending the retrenched workers could not be at the expense of more job losses or the closure of the South Deep operation.
“The region is hereby instructed to set up an interim committee with which to work towards stabilizing the branch,” Sipunzi added in his letter.
Livhuwani Mammburu, NUM national spokesperson, said that representatives would go to the South Deep mine and address the NUM members at the operation.
A new interim South Deep branch restructure would be elected “as soon as possible”.
Thulani Mashibini, the NUM secretary-general at South Deep, confirmed that he was one of the 13 people that had been suspended.
Prior to the suspensions, Mashibini told City Press during an interview that the strike could last until Easter next year. This would mean that the strike could go on for more than five months and would be the longest strike in South Africa’s mining history.
Nick Holland, chief executive of Gold Fields, which owns the loss-making South Deep, told City Press that if members of the NUM did strike until Easter 2019 or “an extended period of time, we may have to contemplate additional layoffs”.
The trade union started its strike at South Deep on Friday, November 2 over the axing of 1 082 employees and 420 contractors at the operation.
Prior to the suspension of the NUM South Deep branch, there had been “political differences” between the NUM head office and Gauteng regional office on the one hand and the branch on the other over the strike.
Gold Fields has invested R32 billion, including the acquisition price of R22 billion, in South Deep since acquiring the mine in 2006.
