Department: Implats does not care about workers
The Department of Mineral Resources
has lashed out at Impala Platinum after the company announced a massive
two-year retrenchment plan on Thursday.
Implats announced will be cutting production at the Rustenburg plant in North West- resulting in the retrenchment of 13 000 workers over a period of two years.
The department’s Ayanda Shezi says they were still in negotiations with Implats about ways in which jobs could be saved when it made the announcement.
ALSO READ: [LISTEN] How Impala Platinum will cut 13 000 jobs in just two years
"There was an agreed process underway with the department, and the company has now gone against that. For government the retrenchment should be considered only as the last resort after all other options have been explored.”
Shezi says that only a company that does not regard its workers as valuable assets would behave in this way.
"This is worst disconcerting considering the high unemployment rate in the country, as reflected in the latest StatsSA survey.
The ministry, once more, urges Implats to reconsider its actions and return to the process we all agreed upon. Now is the time to work collectively and make our country prosper, and desist from behaviour that is careless and without foresight."
The National Union of Mineworkers' Livhuwani Mammburu says to add insult to injury, the union only heard about the decision to retrench workers through the media.