SWAZI UNIONS AID ATTACKED WORKERS

A total of 40 workers were hospitalised after Swazi police attacked them during a legal strike.

And 11 of them are so seriously injured they have not been able to return to work.

These figures were revealed by trade unionists during a public handover of cash to help pay the medical bills of textile workers.

Four public sector unions donated E4,000 (about 500 US Dollars).

At the handover, which received coverage in Swazi newspapers and on Swazi TV, the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT) President Simon Makhanya criticised the police’s attack on the strikers, who were mostly women.

The Weekend Observer (22 March 2008) reported that Makhanya was disappointed at the police ‘who opted to silence the strikers with the nozzle of the gun, while they were engaged in a legal strike’.

The Weekend Observer reported Makhanya saying, ‘It is making us wary and jittery. We will also be going to the table to negotiate on behalf of our members soon. Does this mean that if we fail to agree and our members opt to engage in industrial action we will also be given the same medicine the textile strikers were forced to taste?’

Makhanya went on, ‘The textile strikers were simply demanding a living wage, which was within their rights as the cost of living in the country is extraordinarily high.’

He went on, ‘When they demand better salaries police are deployed to bash them up. Is this a ploy to silence the masses? If it is, sadly for them, it will never work.’

Makhanya said, ‘We are still astounded at the sudden passion police have developed for using their guns.’

Meanwhile, the textile workers union, the Swaziland Manufacturing and Allied Workers Union (SMAWU), is reporting the Swaziland Government to the International Labour Organisation. (The United Nations specialized agency which seeks the promotion of social justice and internationally recognized human and labour rights).

SMAWU President Alex Fakudze told the Weekend Observer (22 March 2008) that it was important for government to define the role of police because the police ended up telling the workers to return to work even though the textile strike was legal.

See also
SWAZI POLICE ‘KILL BABY WITH TEARGAS’
SWAZI POLICE SHOOT IN THE BACK
SWAZI POLICE ATTACK PREGNANT WOMAN
SWAZI POLICE RAMPAGE AGAIN