DYPUSA affiliated truck drivers expected to strike on Monday

Truck drivers and general workers at distribution company SG Convenience are expected to embark on a strike action on Monday. About 700 workers are expected to down tools in Mpumalanga, KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng over wages.

The striking workers are organised under the Dynamic People’s Union of South Africa (DYPUSA), a Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) affiliate.

The union says workers at the company’s warehouses are doing their duties without proper PPE and danger allowances. SG Convenience is a distribution company that delivers goods to small retail stores, hotels and fuel stations.

The union says the strike will affect deliveries at various convenience stores and the hospitality industry.

“The Dynamic People’s Union of South Africa is embarking on a protected strike action that is set to start tomorrow on Monday at 5 O’clock in the morning. The strike is going to be a national strike in Nelspruit, KwaZulu-Natal in Durban and Elandsfontein. The company employs about 700 employees whom majority of them 60% + are members of DYPUSA. The strike is all about the wages, they are getting paid below minimum, they are also paid less allowances, they are also not paid the SNT subsistence allowances. Our members are subjected to guard the trucks, sleep in the trucks in dangerous areas and this company delivers pies, sweets, chocolates and all groceries within the republic of South Africa especially in all fuel stations such as Engen garage, Sasol, global and so on and so on.

This company also supplies snacks in all hotels such as Sun hotels, they’ve got plus minus 300 trucks that will be standing still. The production will be stopped and this company delivers goods to a Kruger National Park and those goods won’t be delivered tomorrow. What we want is a living wage, we’ve submitted the rates, the employees are paid below minimum,” explains Mashudu Raphetha, general Secretary of DYPUSA.

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