South Africa: Workers Strike Against Lay-Offs at Bidvest SACD’s Durban Plant

Resisting the termination of over a hundred employees, workers in the Durban plant of Bidvest South Africa Container Depot (SACD) have been on strike for 20 days. Led by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), they downed tools on January 6. Workers perform crucial logistics tasks such as loading and unloading containers and packing and unpacking goods.

The labor action was provoked after the company served termination notices in late December to 106 of the 187 employees at the company’s Durban plant, informing them that January 31 will be the last day of their work. This amounts to slashing over a third of its total national workforce of 294 employees.

Late-last September, SACD, part of the Bidvest Group which provides supply chain management services, served Section 189 (retrenchment) notice to NUMSA, stating that 106 of its members may be affected by the planned restructuring.

The company reasoned that the restructuring was necessitated due to “the significant downturn and loss of business activity as a direct result of intense market competition, resulting in the underutilization of warehouse services.”

However, on participating in the consultation process initiated by the Section 189 notice, NUMSA learned “that Bidvest SACD has not lost customers and they have not performed as badly as they claimed. We learned that its customers have increased and it is busier than ever. It simply wishes to rake in more profits, and if that means plunging 106 families into poverty, then it is prepared to do that,” the union said in a statement.

Amid an unemployment rate of 40% in the country, “losing a job in this current economic climate is potentially devastating.”

The company is “trying to replace permanent employees” it is terminating “with outsourced ones” to “run away from paying pension fund and medical aid,” Phakimile Hlubi Majola, spokesperson of NUMSA, told Peoples Dispatch. “Outsourced workers earn far less than permanent employees.”

The union had secured an order against the practice from the Constitutional Court in July 2018. “The court very clearly outlined that companies can use temporary employee services, also known as labor brokers, for a maximum period of 3 months. After that they should be treated as permanent employees, with the same pay and benefits. However, many South African companies flout this brazenly,” she added, complaining that the government is taking no measures to set up a regulatory framework to enforce this order of the Constitutional Court.