News about Labor Overseas

South African Workers March for Jobs

5 August, 1999

Thousands of trade unionists marched through the streets of major South African cities Saturday to protest against spiraling job losses in industry, the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) said.

COSATU claimed up to 8,000 people marched in the town of Middleburg in Mpumalanga province, media reports put the figure in the hundreds. Hundreds marched in Johannesburg and Cape Town, while a march through the capital Pretoria was cancelled early Saturday when less than a dozen people turned up, SABC public radio reported. COSATU's Gauteng province secretary Norman Mokoena said the nationwide protests were called to highlight the high number of job losses in the country.

“COSATU has declared a crisis in the economy,”he told the South African Press Association. Mokoena said about 30 percent of the country's workforce were employed on contracts or as casual workers, while the 70 percent employed on a permanent basis did not receive the prescribed salaries and were under-paid.

Meanwhile, over 300, 000 public servants who embarked on a two-day strike last week in support of a 10-percent pay hike return to work as normal on Monday, while labour leaders review the action, COSATU said.