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The National Education Health and Allied Workers’ Union [NEHAWU] in the North West Province has noted the continued arrogance by the employer over the past few days when workers were calling for a speedy resolution of the matters at hand.

The employer chose to use brutality on our members through the use of police who harassed, used teargas, rubber bullets and to some extend used live ammunition on our members despite the fact that these members were involved in a peaceful demonstration and avoided any form of provocation.

Our members were arrested by police who were clearly given an instruction to target certain individuals especially leaders of the protest action. The employer applied more effort in intimidating workers and remains uninterested in engaging in any process of resolving the matters at hand. We have further noted the threats received by some worker leaders of NEHAWU for leading the process of trying to resolve matters raised by our members.

These threats are nothing but a cheap political stunt to try and silence our leaders particularly for raising issues of corruption in the Public Service. We shall continue to raise these matters and we shall soldier on until the battle is won.

We are shocked at the extent which the employer would go in waging a legal battle against their own employees instead to establishing a platform to engage in talks but would rather use the tax payers’ money to take workers to court.

Having being directed by the Court to go back to work, we shall abide by the ruling but will proceed with legal action against the employer until our issues are resolved. We also note that there is no appetite from the political leadership of the MEC’s or the Premier to listen to workers. For us this represents the highest note of arrogance which shall be met by the workers wrath going forward.

We will consult with our legal unit and we shall further consult with our members on a way forward as we plan to continue with the struggle post the legal battles.

We are calling on all our members to go back to work tomorrow as we consult legally and we will be convening mass meetings to give feedback and try find a way forward on the matters at hand broadly.

It must however be noted that NEHAWU remains opposed to any form of privatisation and outsourcing the Public Service, to that end, we shall continue to demand the insourcing of all privatised services in the Public Service.

As a transformative trade union we remain opposed to any form of corruption and maladministration and therefore shall continue blowing the whistle in this regard fearlessly so.

Issued by NEHAWU