The Witness reports that the South African Municipal Workers’ Union (Samwu) has vowed to continue its ongoing strike in Msunduzi until its wage demands are met. This is despite the mounting concerns over disrupted municipal services and ongoing power outages affecting parts of the city for almost a week.

Under heavy police guard, SAMWU members marched from the AS Chetty Building to City Hall on Wednesday morning to meet with municipal management as the labour dispute entered another day. The union initially embarked on an unprotected strike, demanding that workers’ salary grading be adjusted from T3 to T7. The industrial action resulted in significant service disruptions across the city in the lead-up to the recent Comrades Marathon.

From June 11, however, the union obtained a certificate legalising the continuation of its strike action. SAMWU chairperson in Msunduzi, Brandon George, said workers had yet to receive any offer from management since the strike began. “Instead of doing the right thing, they (the employer) tried to interdict our strike two times but lost both applications with costs. We will continue until our demands are met,” said George.

While some progress was made in restoring electricity to several suburbs, some residents remained without power on Wednesday. IFP proportional representative (PR) councillor Shamiell Ally said electricity was restored to many affected areas at about 1.20 am following overnight repair work. The outages were caused by a cable fault affecting parts of Northdale, Raisethorpe, the Northway Mall area, and Woodlands. Teams of contractors worked through the night to repair the damage.

Ally said the jumper cable behind Northdale Hospital, which had contributed to the outages, was repaired at around 5 am on Wednesday. “Many parts of Woodlands were back on,” he said. However, power had still not been restored to some sections of Allandale Drive and surrounding areas by Wednesday morning. Ally said a contractor was expected to attend to the remaining faults.

Meanwhile, the municipality said reports of intimidation had complicated efforts to respond to service interruptions. Msunduzi Municipality spokesperson Ntobeko Mkhize said reports had been received that some employees were being threatened. She said this had made it difficult for contractors to attend to the outages and carry out repair work. Mkhize said the municipality would provide a further update once more information became available. The strike continues as workers and management remain deadlocked, with no indication yet of when an agreement may be reached.

by Chris Ndaliso