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- Public service unions in the Western Cape have decided to postpone their participation in the national day of action on Tuesday.
- The decision was made in response to the ongoing strike by the South African National Taxi Council in the province.
- While other demonstrations in the national day of action will go ahead as planned, Western Cape structures postponed over concerns for members' safety.
- For more financial stories, go to the News24 Business front page.
An ongoing taxi strike in the Western Cape has forced public service unions in the province to postpone their marches as part of a one-day strike about the deadlocked public wage talks.
Public service unions affiliated with Cosatu, the SA Federation of Trade Unions (Saftu), and the Federation of Unions of SA (Fedusa), representing an estimated 800 000 members, were supposed to embark on a one-day strike including marches in all nine provinces.
However, the three federations said in the joint statement that members in the Western Cape will have to postpone their demonstrations due to a taxi strike by the SA National Taxi Council (Santaco). Seven unions affiliated with the federations are in deadlocked wage talks with the government after rejecting a 3% baseline wage increase offer.
READ | Unions reject government's 'misleading' final public wage offer
Santaco embarked on its strike in response to the Western Cape provincial government's decision to cancel its Blue Dot project, an initiative aimed at introducing rewards and incentives to taxi operators that improve their service and road safety practices. Monday saw reports of buses being set alight in the province as the Santaco strike began.
The three federations said in a statement that leadership met on Monday to consider their options and decided to postpone a planned march in Cape Town for the safety of members.
"The leadership of Cosatu, Fedusa, and Saftu met this morning to reflect on the violent status of the Santaco action in the province and the safety of our members and workers. After the provincial engagement with Santaco we came to the conclusion that the safety of our members will not be guaranteed should we proceed with the action," the statement said.
The statement called on Santaco, the Western Cape government, and the City of Cape Town to "find an amicable solution to the impasse".
Officials in various unions affiliated with the three federations confirmed that the taxi strike would only affect the national day of action in the Western Cape and demonstrations would continue in other all provinces as planned.
READ | Govt clarifies that 'final offer' to public sector unions is an effective 7.5%
The federations announced the national day of action last week after Public Servants' Association (PSA) held a one-day strike earlier in the month. The government said the impact of that strike on the state of public service was minimal.
The PSA said it planned to intensify its demonstrations and was considering a boycott of municipal rates as well as marches to ministers' homes.
