COSATU solidarity with Kraft Foods strikers 27- 07 - 06

COSATU solidarity with Kraft Foods strikers

The Gauteng Provincial Congress of the Congress of South African Trade Unions on 22-23 July 2006 passed a resolution to campaign against the Kraft Foods company and to support the 384 members of the Food and allied Workers Union members who are on strike at Kraft’s Elandsfontein plant.

COSATU Gauteng is dismayed by the exploitation of these workers who have now been on strike for nine weeks, and by the employer who initially locked out the workers and then employed scab labour.

Kraft Foods is an international company, and we see this dispute as part of a global attack on workers’ rights.

We therefore call upon all members of COSATU, the Tripartite Alliance partners and the Mass Democratic Movement to boycott the following products that Kraft Foods manufactures:

· Royal Baking Powder, Royal Puddings, Royal Jelly and all other ‘Royal’ brands
· Manhattan Sweets
· Lecol Juice and Squash
· Riviera Biscuits
· Oreo Biscuits
· Jacobs Coffee
· Kraft Margarine
· Kraft Mayonaise
· Toblerone and Cote d’Or Chocolate.

The programme of action will be as follows:

o March by workers in companies next to Kraft Foods in Elandsfontein on 1 August
o Picket, march and sit-in at Kraft Foods’ Head Office
o International solidarity campaign through the International Union of Food Workers Unions.

COSATU Gauteng further calls on:

· The Minister of Labour to intervene, as both the SA Minister and Chairperson of the ILO Governing Body
· The CCMA to call on both parties to come to the negotiating table to resolve the impasse.

The workers’ demands are:

o A 10% across-the-board pay increase, to which the employers responded with first a 5% and then a 6.5% offer, though this has now been withdrawn by the employer
o Severance pay on retirement to be three weeks’ pay for each year worked (currently it is two weeks.)
o A moratorium on retrenchments.

For further information please contact Mosanku Tseki on 082 498 5840 or Siphiwe Mgcina on 082 465 8336

In a separate dispute, Coca Cola have suspended more than FAWU members, including shop stewards, at their Wadeville, Germiston, plant, in contravention of the ‘peace clause’ in an agreement reached between the company and FAWU after a strike.

Patrick Craven (National Spokesperson)
Congress of South African Trade Unions
1-5 Leyds Cnr Biccard Streets
Braamfontein, 2017

P.O.Box 1019
Johannesburg, 2000
SOUTH AFRICA

Tel: +27 11 339-4911/24
Fax: +27 11 339-5080/6940/ 086 603 9667
Cell: 0828217456
E-Mail: patrick@cosatu.org.za