Employers’ scant wage offers in the “thriving” platinum sector this year are a provocative gamble, a mining analyst warns.
Negotiation season kicked off on the heels of a court battle against a merger by two major employers of the dominant union, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu), which was asking for a R17,000 base salary hike, amounting to a 48% increase. Rival union National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) asked Anglo Platinum (Amplats) for 15%.
Earlier this year, Amcu lost its court bid to halt Sibanye-Stillwater’s imminent takeover of Lonmin. The latter offered wage hikes of R1,000 a month for the lowest-paid workers and an extra R800 a month over the next two years, while Lonmin offered R300 to R400 over the next three years.
Amcu president Joseph Mathunjwa expressed his disappointment and mining expert Dick Forslund said it was a very ambitious starting point on the part of the employers, given that the platinum sector was far better off this year than it was in the harrowing 2013-2014 economic crunch.
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