Unions set conditions

Wed, 11 Jun 2008

Unions representing more than 70 percent of Telkom workers said they would not support any bid for the company or its proposed restructuring if they did not have a no job loss agreement before hand.

Holding a joint press conference Solidarity, the Communications Workers Union and the SA Communications Union (Sacu) said they had to consider certain conditions before they would talk about a bid for Telkom or its proposed restructuring.

"You can't deal with a process of restructuring and start with the tail end," Joe Chauke, President of the CWU said.

"Do we need to carry on with the [restructuring] process while there is a bid for Telkom?" Koos Fourie of Sacu asked.

The union said once the issue of the bid was resolved, an investigation into the proposed restructuring needed to be undertaken.

Once that was done, the unions would discuss a no job loss agreement before considering any negotiations with Telkom.

Telkom has indicated that it wants to outsource more than 90 percent of its activities by August.

The unions said the August deadline was not viable.