The Cape Chamber of
Commerce has called the decision by the Minister of
Minerals and Energy Ngoako Ramatlhodi to amend labour legislation as a bad
idea.
Minister Ramatlhodi said the labour
legislation need to be amended to give more power to government to intervene in
a protracted strike.
Cape Chamber of Commerce President Janine
Myburgh said the workers are the one’s suffering and their voices need to be
heard.
Myburgh said all the Minister needs is the
power to compel workers to vote on whether or not to continue a strike on a
secret ballad. We already have a situation which employers say the majority of
workers want to end the strike but the Union says the majority
want to continue.
“There’s a simple way to settle this argument,
ask the workers to vote on a secret ballad which is independently supervised
possibly by the IEC. When the results come in everyone will know what the real
situation is and that should greatly simplify the negotiations Myburgh added.