The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has strongly condemned De Beers' decision to pause production at the Venetia mine in Limpopo for two years and to issue a Section 189A notice to employees, a move the union says threatens the livelihoods of 1,134 permanent employees at Venetia and a further 80 employees at De Beers Sightholder Sales South Africa (DBSSSA).
Under South Africa’s Labour Relations Act, a Section 189A process is triggered when a company employing more than 50 people contemplates dismissing a specific, prescribed number of employees based on operational requirements.
Mining Weekly quoted NUM national health and safety secretary and diamond sector chief negotiator Masibulele Naki as saying that the union is deeply disturbed by how management communicated the decision.
He said De Beers attempted to portray it as a sudden and unavoidable crisis when it had long been aware of the challenges facing the diamond industry.
“Workers cannot be treated as disposable tools that are discarded whenever companies face economic pressures. De Beers has known about the challenges confronting the diamond market for a long time. It is therefore disingenuous to present this announcement as a sudden crisis. Workers and their trade union should have been engaged honestly and transparently long before a Section 189A notice was issued,” said Naki.
He said that workers should not be the first to face wage cuts or layoffs, especially given that staff salaries are not the reason for the company's financial struggles.
The NUM has demanded that De Beers and DBSSSA urgently consider viable alternatives such as retraining and skilling programmes, temporary job preservation measures, a reduction in non-essential expenditure, and a comprehensive review of executive and management costs.
The union also called on South Africa's departments of Mineral and Petroleum Resources and Employment and Labour, organised labour, and all key stakeholders to intervene urgently to protect jobs at Venetia and DBSSSA.
Mathew Nyaungwa, Editor-In-Chief, Rough & Polished
