Fired Medupi workers wreak havoc on SA power supply

By Peroshni Govender.(Reuters) – South African power utility Eskom said on Friday that workers who were fired for destroying property at the Medupi power plant it is building were blocking employees from entering the construction site..The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) also said some of its members had stayed away from working at the plant in solidarity with the fired workers..Labour disruption and technical faults have increased costs at the long-delayed Medupi coal-fired plant, expected to start partial operations and generate 800 megawatts of extra electricity by July.."There is minimal work going on at the site as some dismissed union members were intimidating and stopping others from entering the site," Eskom spokesman Khulu Phasiwe told Reuters, adding that only some 3,000 of the 21,000 workers at the site are currently working..Phasiwe said the dismissed workers were intimidating employees and forcing them off buses which shuttle them to the site, but the strike was not affecting work on Unit 6 of the plant, which is expected to start generating power in July..The labour strife began after about 1,000 workers were issued with dismissal notices for allegedly damaging property during a one-day strike last month over poor living conditions and higher pay..Steve Nhlapo, head of collective bargaining for NUMSA, said the workers who had decided to stay away from Medupi were acting on their own volition in solidarity with their fired colleagues, saying the same action could befall them.."The workers have now organised their own solidarity strike because you can't just fire their colleagues. They feel that this is unfair and could happen to them," he said..Unions, the companies contracted to build Eskom's plant and officials from the utility are expected to meet this afternoon to discuss the disruption at Medupi, Nhlapo said..Once fully completed, Medupi would become South Africa's first new power station to come online in 20 years.

Fired Medupi workers wreak havoc on SA power supply

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