The Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) says they expect a total blackout at the South African Broadcasting Corporation (SABC) on Friday from 11am to 2pm.
Workers at the SABC affiliated to the Broadcasting, Electronic, Media and Allied Workers Union (BEMAWU) and the CWU will on Wednesday proceed to the Union Buildings in Pretoria to hand over the memorandum to the President.
The CWU’s Aubrey Tshabalala says the demands contained in a memorandum include amongst others calls for an urgent meeting with the President, the dissolution of the SABC Board and for the public broadcaster to be placed under administration.
Tshabalala says they want the President to stop the SABC from forging ahead with a restructuring exercise that will see over 300 people lose their jobs.
He has also outlined the plan of strike action for the week.
“Today (Wednesday) no worker should be at work in terms of our programme, we should be marching in the regions, they should be staying at home. Tomorrow (Thursday) workers will be at work but it will be a go slow, on the third day which would be Friday, we intend to have a blackout from 11am to 2pm but before that and after that it will be a go slow. We will then reveal our programme obviously later on Friday for the next days. We want management not to anticipate what will be our next action and of course we will be waiting to hear how will the government in the form of the head of state respond to our demands and how we will go forward. “
BEMAWU’s Hannes Du Buisson speaks about strike action:
‘No work, no pay’
The SABC says the ‘No work, no pay’ principle will apply to workers who go on strike.
It says the strike will not include independent contractors and that it has made contingency plans to stay on air.
Last month, BEMAWU lost its bid to compel the SABC to retract redundancy letters issued as part of its restructuring process:
