Strike

S. Africa gold miners set to go on strike

JOHANNESBURG - South African union leaders warned yesterday, a day before a strike in the gold sector, that mine owners' handling of pay talks could provoke violence, while bosses said wage hikes would force mine closures and cost thousands of jobs.

   The National Union of Mine-workers (NUM), which represents about two-thirds of more than 120,000 unionised gold miners in Africa's biggest economy, is set to strike from 3 September 2013.

   With stoppages in the automotive and construction sectors already sapping the struggling economy, shutting gold mines could cripple an industry that has produced a third of the world's bullion but is now in rapid decline.

   Labour and management are poles apart on the issue of wages, with the NUM seeking 60 per cent pay hikes for entry-level miners and its more hardline rival, the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (AMCU), pushing for 150 per cent raises.

   Companies say they cannot afford this in the face of soaring costs and depressed prices.

   The president of South Africa's Chamber of Mines warned unions against stoking workers' hopes. Mr Mark Cutifani, who is also chief executive of mining giant Anglo American said :

   "Promoting expectations above the capacity of the industry to pay is a dangerous road that may have tragic consequences for empolyees who do not understand how close we are to economic devastation in certain sectors."

   South Africa's gold and platinum sectors are still recovering from a wave of violent, wildcat strikes last year.

   A gold industry shutdown could cost South Africa more than  US$35 million a day in lost output, according to calculations based on the spot gold price and a Chamber of Mines estimate that the sector would stop producing about 760kg a day.

   South Africa's gold industry, which once accounted for almost 80 per cent of global bullion output, now produces just 6 per cent of the world total.

   It has been laid low by a combination of geological and economic setbacks. After more than a century of mining, the remaining ore lies deep underground and is costly and dangerous to extract. Labour and power costs have also soared.

REUTERS

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Greek civil servants on two-day nationwide strike

Motorcyclists gathering in front of the Greek Parliament building, holding flags of OLME, the Greek union of teachers.

ATHENS - Thousands of civil servants marched through Athens, the Greek capital, and the second largest city of Thessaloniki yesterday, as a two-day nation-wide strike against planned job cuts shut down all public services.

   Schools and courts were closed and hospitals were functioning with reduced staff. Trains were halted for four hours, and journalists joined in with a three-hour work stoppage, pulling news broadcasts off the air.

   The walkouts, called by Greece's union of civil servants, aimed to pressure the government into repealing unpopular austerity measures.

   The protests following strikes earlier in the week. On Monday, at least 17,000 teachers and civil servants took to the streets and on Tuesday, hospital workers and lawyers joined the demonstrations.

   But officials have vowed not to back down. Plans call for the suspension on partial pay of 25,000 civil servants this year in a drive to reduce the size of the public sector and meet conditions to continue receiving rescue loans. Many of those suspended likely will eventually lose their jobs.

   The country has been depending on bailouts from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and other European countries since May 2010. In return, it has implemented a series of austerity measures to reform its economy.

   They have included deep cuts to state salaries and pensions and repeated rounds of tax hikes, measures which many blame for prolonging a deep recession that is now in its sixth year. Unemployment is above 27 per cent, the highest in the European Union, while it reaches nearly 60 per cent for those under the age of 25.

   Debt inspectors from the IMF, European Commission and European Central Bank are due back in Athens to review progress on reforms next week.

ASSOCIATED PRESS