A week-long strike at Transnet Freight Rail (TFR), which started on April 8, caused “chaos” on the Johannesburg- Durban container rail route, according to Lawrie Bateman, MD of MSC Logistics. When he talked to FTW on April 15, his company had 600 boxes stuck in Johannesburg because empty wagons had not been returned from Durban, and he estimated that 1 200 containers were awaiting uplift at the Port of Durban. Eddie McGregor of Grindrod Intermodal confirmed that things had “begun to clog up” in Durban. “With containers not being offloaded at Durban,” he said, “the wagons can’t be turned around and sent back to Gauteng.” On Friday of last week Bateman said that although MSC had got a couple of its trains through, there were still other trains stacked up at Kings Rest, unable to get into the marshalling yard at the Port of Durban. TFR’s communiqué of that day carried the following bad news: “Currently there are 483 x 20-foot and 408 x 40-ft import containers still to be railed. “Msc Nefeli is in port with 200 x 20-ft empty containers to City Deep still to be discharged. “Trains at Kings Rest – 16 trains, 662 containers.” Selby Dlamini, communications and media manager at TFR in Durban, told FTW that the “legal strike” had been called by the SA Transport & Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) members who were employed by TFR Durban operations. “They are demanding the removal of the local employee relations manager,” he added, “alleging that the relationships between the manager and their members had broken down.” The issue had arisen early in March, according to Dlamini, when Satawu members submitted a petition to local management demanding the removal of the manager. At two meetings on March 16 and March 25, the union presented a list of issues in support of their demand. “ As these issues were unsubstantiated allegations,” Dlamini said, “management responded by proposing an independent investigator to be appointed jointly to investigate the allegations and establish whether there were any irregularities on the part of the manager in the execution of his duties. Management further suggested that the outcome of the investigation would be binding on both parties.” This offer was made because one of the conditions of the Labour Act states that it would be inappropriate to remove an employee on the basis of untested allegations without having followed due processes. But Satawu rejected the management offer and eventually opted for the strike from the evening of April 8. Meetings were then held on April 9, 14, 15 and 16 in an attempt to break the deadlock. In an update by Dlamini just before our Monday publishing deadline, he told FTW that the Friday meeting saw both parties coming to an agreement. The TFR manager was placed on paid suspension with the strikers officially back at work from Saturday. “The backlog has been cleared at all out yards,” he added. But Bateman disagreed. “The backlog hasn’t been cleared,” he said. His company’s Monday morning figures showed 1 240 containers still sitting at Durban container terminal (DCT) waiting for trains; seven trains (containing 550 export containers) still waiting at Kings Rest; and containers still waiting at the City Deep terminal in Johannesburg from April 14. Bateman reckoned it would still take three or four days to clear.
