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South African
commercial workers picket Shoprite Checkers : "Shocking attitude from a company that prides itself as the biggest retailer on the African continent" For the second day, South African commercial workers picketed the continent's largest retailer Shoprite Checkers, today Wednesday. In a statement to iafrica.com today, the president of UNI Commerce affiliate Saccawu Mike Tau said that the company's attitude towards its workers was "shocking". Saccawu has chosen to start their efforts to force an agreement by lunch-time pickets locally, which would later be escalated to include nationwide protests. The union's province secretary Moses Makhanya told the SABC News yesterday that this picketing would continue until the end of this month. This open labour conflict is a result of a longstanding refusal by the company to make a reasonable settlement with the union on wages and employment conditions. Saccawu, which has a large membership of some 40,000 workers in Shoprite Checkers, has also been unhappy about the company's failure to acknowledge the particular needs of its part-time and casual workers, as well as workers in the rural areas. Most of these take home a pay which is far below subsistence levels, surely something which sparks the comments that Africa's largest retailer does indeed show a "shocking attitude". Among the union demands is that casual and part-time workers be provided a uniform like their full-time colleagues are. It is not hard to imagine the extent of sacrifices that these lowest-paid workers would have to make by paying for their uniforms themselves. The company has also refused to negotiate with the union about supporting child care facilities.
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