THE Chemical, Energy, Paper, Printing, Wood and Allied Workers Union (Ceppwawu), a Cosatu affiliate, says it will oppose an application by Sasol for a wage agreement exemption and retrenchments.
The three-day meeting between Ceppwawu and Sasol will be held from Monday to Wednesday at the company’s attorney’s chambers in Sandton, Johannesburg.
Ceppwawu said thousands of workers will lose their jobs if Sasol is let off the hook.
The union said Sasol 2.0 restructuring has already taken away all workers’ non-statutory benefits.
“The union members must endure a double jeopardy, first with no increase through a wage agreement exemption application and secondly by a Sasol 2.0, a retrenchment process clothe as restructuring, which CEPPWAWU is opposing both applications,” said Ceppwawu general secretary Welile Nolingo.
Nolingo said Sasol wants to suffocate workers further, first, through a retrenchment process and then, ‘running to the National Bargaining Council for Chemical Industry at full speed seeking to be exempted on a wage agreement, which is not a fault of the workers but because of bad and wasteful management investment on an ill-gotten US-Lake Charles facility in Louisiana dodo project’.
Nolingo said CEPPWAWU, therefore called for the government to increase its shares and re-nationalise Sasol, protect South African jobs, and for Sasol to remain a South African company.
“SASOL is a good example that private sector wizards have been playing and fleecing with our money. They were handed a big playground and they vandalised it. The private sector- partnership with government doesn’t work, as much as it is proposed for Eskom, SAA and other SOEs, it’s a stillborn,” said Nolingo.
“The national Union demands that all the directors of these private companies must ‘pay back the money’ and return all the monies they squandered. They did not reinvest the South African surplus value inside South African market but chose to waste it in an ill-gotten US-Lake Charles facility in Louisiana dodo project.”
Nolingo said CEPPWAWU will use its labour power to fight tooth and nail and save jobs at Sasol.
“The Union has not forgotten that in June 2020, Sasol annual report the #Sasolgate paid its former two black and white executives Bongani Nqwababa & Stephen Cornell about R96 million in benefits and separation packages as sweepstake winners,” said Nolingo.
“Cornell got a total remuneration of R68.65m with a R20.8m salary, a golden handshake of R21,65m and long term incentive of R1.86m. The black executive Nqwababa got a total pay of R27.2m, a package of R14.3m, R8.7m salary and incentive of R1.9m.”
- Inside Politics
