Pretoria - Striking Transnet staff is set to march across the streets of Johannesburg today over wage issues with the parastatal.
South African Transport and Allied Workers Union's (Satawu) policy researcher Jane Barrett said the mass march will begin at the Mary Fitzgerald Square at 11am and end with them delivering a memorandum to Transnet offices in Braamfontein.
Additionally the senior national commissioner for the Commission for Conciliation Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) has confirmed that mediation between Satawu and the United Transport and Allied Trade Union (Utatu) will start today.
"The Senior National Commissioner for the CCMA has confirmed that mediation between Labour (Satawu and Utatu) and Transnet will commence at 2pm today in Johannesburg," said the union.
Though Satawu does not anticipate the mediation to be a quick or easy process, it says this marks the start of processes towards resolving the deadlock.
Satawu workers downed tools on Monday after rejecting a second offer of 11 percent increase across the board from the transport parastatal. Utatu joined the protest action on Wednesday.
" It was never an across the board increase and was an offer that would have provided less take home pay for two thirds of the workforce than the previous 8 percent offer. The offer represented the same overall wage spend by Transnet. The allocation of spend on employment cost had simply been rearranged," said Barrett.
