Namdeb strike off

WINDHOEK – An eleventh hour intervention by Government and unions’ top leadership has averted the mass strike at Namdeb.

The strike had been planned to start in the early hours of today at all Namdeb diamond mines.

On Friday, Deputy Minister of Labour and Social Welfare, Alpheus Muheua, accompanied by the top brass from the National Union of Namibian Workers and Mineworkers Union of Namibia, flew to Oranjemund to meet with Namdeb executives led by Managing Director, Inge Zaamwani-Kamwi.

Not only did the meeting manage to call off the strike, but it also persuaded the Oranjemund Mineworkers Union (MUN) branch to refrain from making any other inflammatory comments in the media.

“We have reached an agreement, there is no more strike,” mun branch secretary at Oranjemund, Polivester Hangula, told New Era yesterday.

Hangula would not comment on whether the union stands by its earlier comment that Namdeb executives betrayed workers by awarding salary increases to senior managers, while there is a standing agreement with workers to freeze all salary increases during the global economic crisis.

Namdeb would not, when contacted on Friday, deny or confirm the statement by the union that senior managers did indeed receive salary increases, along with other allowances, at a time when the company had asked employees to forgo salary increases to help the company ride out the global recession.

“Increases have not been applied in 2010. However, there were salary adjustments made to align job categories that were behind, in line with competitors, as per outcomes of an objective remuneration benchmarking exercise. The adjustments included categories within the Bargaining Unit,” was all that Namdeb public relations machinery churned out when prodded for comment.

It was this issue that infuriated the workers, who claimed that Namdeb did “hide under economic crisis” to freeze salary increases, and hence voted for a strike.

The strike was most certainly destined to dent the diamond company just emerging from a serious global economic crisis where it incurred huge losses.

Diamond production plummeted during the 2008 and 2009 global economic crisis as demand for diamonds hit rock bottom. Zaamwani-Kamwi says in the past two years the company was forced “to expect from our employees to bear with us as we battled for the very survival of our company”.

The union, together with Namdeb, said they would issue a joint statement on what they have agreed on.

Workers were asking for a 13-percent increase in salaries and wages, as well as 10 percent allowance for working at remote posts. Namdeb is offering 10 percent for salaries and wages and 5 percent in allowances.