Unions at Eskom have urged their members to return to work on Wednesday as the power utility struggled to keep lights on due to an ongoing strike which saw the country move from stage 4 of power cuts to 6 on Tuesday.
Eskom announced on Tuesday that it would introduce stage 6 loadshedding from 4pm to 10pm and thereafter return to stage 4 which has been implemented over the past few days.
The only time the country experienced stage 6 loadshedding was in 2019.
Late on Tuesday, the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) and the National Union Metalworkers of SA (Numsa) urged workers to bring things back to “normal”.
“Negotiations have been able to break new ground with a new offer, which will be tabled at the Central Bargaining Forum (CBF) this coming Friday, 1 July 2022.
“Given the fact that Eskom has finally agreed to return to the negotiating table and there is a new offer which will be formally presented on Friday… NUM and Numsa leadership are calling on our members at Eskom to give the process of negotiations a chance.
“This includes a consultation processes with workers themselves on the new offer that is a product of negotiations between the two unions and Eskom over the past two days to unlock the current deadlock.
“In light of these developments, we call on workers at Eskom to normalise the situation given that Eskom has returned to the negotiating table,” the unions said in a joint statement.
Workers at different Eskom plants have been on strike, demanding between 8% and 12% wage increases while the power utility was willing to increase the salaries by 4%, 4.5% and 5.3%, in a staggered system.
Moving the country to stage 6 drew criticism from business organisation Business Unity SA (Busa), which said it is a serious blow to an economy that has been struggling with low growth.
“We now urge the government to do whatever is necessary to enable Eskom to move away from high levels of loadshedding as a matter of urgency, to deal decisively with reported acts of sabotage at Eskom by enabling law and order agencies to act with urgency to bring those responsible for such sabotage to book and to remove any remaining barriers to private sector generation of power and getting renewables onto the grid as quickly as possible,” said Busa CEO Cas Coovadia.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.