Kuvukiland

If they eran R10,000.00 then surely an increase of R2,500.00 is nothing. Give it to them and end this saga. If workers return to work without this demand met, they will attacked by organisors of the strike.
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lindsay

they should just close the mine and let them go
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Africa01

Guys do you think people can fight like this while they earning what has been stated by this corupt NUM? And even what mr boss statement is false, there is no such things like that he is lying, and wene ausi Lindsay ha ore batswale mine, how people gonna support their families dont talk like a sutupid minister who doesnt know whats going on her sector.





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mthosam

the stupid thing that Media and the public do is to believe what one stupid politician say. if this people are really earning 10000, can labour dept support that. you sowetan, lazy puppet, you should be telling us that NUM and Lonmin reps are saying 10000, and according to your finding the amount is. stop wrting from tv news coverage.
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Madamara

This mine bosses are lying why would people earning 10 grand be prepared to die for 2500 doesnt make sense and yet the claim to give them monthly bonuses.....BS
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Ompas

guys,you are missing the pot here,this figures are correct,this miners have provident fund,pesion fund,medical aid for himself and his wife and maybe 2 kids,uif and the huge tax that the company has to comply to and this guys have different deductions on thier pays.The miner doesnt look at the gross pay they only interested at the nett pay and some of the its their fault that they earning such low net cause of their commitments.
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Lehido

Ompas
guys,you are missing the pot here,this figures are correct,this miners have provident fund,pesion fund,medical aid for himself and his wife and maybe 2 kids,uif and the huge tax that the company has to comply to and this guys have different deductions on thier pays.The miner doesnt look at the gross pay they only interested at the nett pay and some of the its their fault that they earning such low net cause of their commitments.
-------------------------------------------

Thank you
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piet

@ africa 01

yeh its very possible.look all the service protests around the country.people cry that government its not doing anything.but at the end people are just lazy and wanted everything on the table.

NUM and the EMPLOYER cant do anything with an individual budget.some times education its rilly needed on our people

I am against the strikers carrying weapons,even yestad they wer armed and refuse presidential team visits,so ar those people want help.

@ lindsay

i agree with you,they can just close the mine, and re-open it another time ,mayb re employ again.
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lindsay

@ africa01

of course they should close the mine those miners will eat rocks. whats the use of opening the mine and pleading with workers to come to work if they don't want to work or they are being threatened by those hooligans who don't want to work. so what is the use of opening the mine if there is no production at all everybody is loosing money maarn.
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kutsukuyi

PEOPLE HAVE FORGOTTEN ABOUT AURORA MINERS. GOVERNMENT HAS KEPT QUIET, WAITING FOR ANOTHER TRAGEDY TO HAPPEN THEN SAY ITS UNFORTUNATE

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Macamito

i am not taking side here but what i can tell you is Lonmin is the best paying platinum mine
i am working for Anglo-American Platinum and we have lost many colleagues to Lonmin and
most of them still wants to go to Lonmin,if we are on the same job and our BROP(Basic Rate Of Pay) is R15000 and i go to loan sharks borrowing uncessesarily must i blame the company for underpaying me because obvious my deduction will go up, what does that tell you don't just comment for the sake of it.
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Nolo

@Ompas
I culdnt hv said it beta maself, no education bt demanding 12500, these unions are to b blamed more especialy amcu, i rememba some months back, these amcu members are so cruel...they were killing other employees who were going on overtime no 1 said a thing, now coz they r the 1s dead we shud cry 4 them, aaag man
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Flemza

I I can`t comment here my comment will stear a can of worms , but if we are talking about salary adjust ments , lets us use % not figures then this will make a lot of sense the miners from R 10 000.00 to R 12 500.00 are asking for an adjustment of 25% and from R4 000.00 to R12 500.00 are asking for an adjustment of 312.5%
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MommaC

Kuvukiland

actually it is closer to 11grand but ....

3,000 workers x R2,500 = R7,500,000 x 12 months = R90,000,000

That doesn't take into consideration the added amounts that the company would pay towards the pension contribution and how it would affect other bonuses. Considering the precarious financial state of Lonmin at the moment, I don't think they could handle that. The platinum mine in Lydenburg has already closed. If Lonmin sets a standard that says people going on a murderous rampage is rewarded with high increases, we will be looking at a problem.
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babyfats

yaaaa ne Mzansi
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P4T

@ kutsukuyi. As hurtful as this may sound? Ain't nothing will ever happen with the Aurora Mine case. That's how how the justice system of South Africa works because whether you may agree with this or not but the fact is that people are not equal in front of the law. There is ample tangible evidence to this inconsistency.

Peace.
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P4T

People wow,wow, wow! Equally there are many politicians with no form of qualifications or even common thinking abilities but earn more than doctors, scientists, accountants, et. al.

Those miners (digging rocks underneath the surface of the earth) are the core of the mine. Without them the mine bosses won't even dream of making profits.

Point is: the miners took a cue from somewhere and they have looked no further than from many South African politicians.

Solution is that every job earning must be weighted against its contribution to the bottom line, ie profits then let everybody be happy. Just stop the greed that is perpetuated by the capitalist system :maximise earnings and reduce all costs (which include human captial costs) to the bone
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Ompas

@P4T,there are machines that can be used to drill underground and believe u me,after this strike,the mines will consider repalcing these guys with this machines and their future look bleak!
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P4T

@ Ompas. Then let the mining houses use such machines - at least they won't die in the process of that - unlike humans who risk dying due to a rockfall. The reason that they will not machanise is coz labour is cheaper than such machines.

But the reality is that compared to mines in Australia and elsewhere in the first world where such commodies are being sold at, South African labour is still the cheapest otherwise no Lonmin of this world would be doing business in South Africa if they weren't going to make certain guaranteed profit margins.

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MommaC

P4T

Salaries are calculated according to the accountability scale. The CEO gets a big salary because he is accountable for the entire running of the operation and a mistake by him would cost the company billions. The guy sweeping the yard gets a little salary because he is accountable for nothing and a mistake by him would cost the company nothing more than a new broom.

Another factor in salary determination is supply and demand. The accountant gets a big salary because there are not 25 million experienced accountants looking for work. The guy who digs ditches gets a little salary because there are 25 million unskilled workers looking for work
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TKay

"NUM spokesman Lesiba Seshoka dismissed claims that there were workers who still earned R4000. "Their gross is between R10000 and R12000, and their take-home differs, based on deductions."

Lonmin executive vice-president Mark Munroe told Talk Radio 702 that rock drillers were paid a gross of R10000 plus a bonus, dependant on production. He said each worker pocketed about R1500 in bonuses on average each month."
_______________________________________________________________________
If this is the case why are they striking then


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MommaC

TKay

When NUM negotiated the two year deal, they left the rock drillers out. Nobody seems to know why or how that happened.

The rock drillers weren't happy and approached management. Management agreed that they had been left out and arranged for an extra danger bonus of (I stand under correction) R700 a month.

NUM threw a complete fit because management had negotiated directly with the miners and threatened a walk out if they didn't take the offer back and negotiate through them.

Management told the rock drillers that they had to go through NUM and the offer was no longer valid

The rock drillers told NUM to get stuffed and walked out. The rest of the workforce decided that if the rock drillers wanted more money than what was negotiated, then so did they - so they walked out.

AMCU started talking to the miners and NUM lost an awful lot of support. The management then told NUM that they no longer had a 50% representation of the workers so they would have to share the negotiating table.

That is when the bloodshed started.
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P4T

Momma C I am not arguing that their salaries be equal to that of the CEO but pointing out that they must also be given a reasonable sum which is proportional to their contribution to the bottom line of the company. That is how modern companies operate - even the ones in Britain, USA, etc. That is the human capital paradigm shift that South African companies ought to strive to emulate. I would not put it the way you say it, that underground miners are unskilled and ubiquitous. For instance when the Gautrain's underground digging had to be made the construction engineers specifically sought workers who had undergound mining experience to do the job because it may seem to be an easy job but there is alot of skills required from such workers, albeit they just don't have a qualification for it.
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MommaC

P4T

That is the crux. The experience.
A rock driller has a bloody hard job. It is physically demanding and incredibly dangerous. That is why an inexperienced person starts at R7.000 as a rock driller. I know university graduates that don't start on that much money - and they have a student loan to repay.

Some twit of a reporter was shown the pay slip of a winch operator (completely different to a rock driller) who has garnishee orders for child support and the reporter put in the bottom line of the slip into an article. The other lazy reporters didn't bother to check anything and simply carried on the lie that the rock drillers earned R4,000 a month.
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lindsay

@MommaC

ok thats the crux of the matter, so Num is to be blamed for the bloodshed and by extension Cosatu and then the ANC. so those idiots were k!ll ed because unions were greedy and of course their stupid witchdoctor.
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sgubhusenkwishi

This NUM is corrupted and is the one that betrays the struggle of the workers to enrich its fat cats.Coming to pay we need a proof of basic pay before over time or bonus excuses.
Because if this two are confused the greedy capitalists might abuse people into working twice the expected hours for the same pay, which remains a slavery we are against. Lastly why should the deductions be more than the take home cash? Is it the workers choice or rogue corruptees robbing workers of their earnings, in the name of saving for the future, when people are struggling to cope with the living costs today. There is a lot of investigations required doing here.
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MommaC

lindsay

The whole sorry bunch handled it badly. From mine management to the cops and everyone inbetween.

I just hope that lessons are learned from this and it never happens again
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