Transporters count the cost of Swazi labour strife

MBABANE – Swaziland’s worst labour strife in a decade has entered its third week, affecting 16 000 workers in the textile industry. With management unwilling to compromise on a 12% pay rise, at least one major garment maker has threatened to close down, at a cost of 2000 jobs. Citing minor acts of vandalism and strikers impeding workers who wish to go to their jobs, police have attacked unarmed marchers on nearly a daily basis with tear gas and rubber bullets, resulting in several hospitalisations. Human rights groups have condemned police aggression. Costs are also being tallied by transport firms that have counted on textile clients for significant business since Asian-owned factories moved to Matsapha around 2000 to take advantage of Swaziland’s preferential trade treaties with the US and Europe. Swaziland Railways is also a transporter of inputs and an exporter of finished goods shipped out of Durban. The Swaziland Textile Association (STEA) says the industry operates on razorthin profits, and the strike may result in forfeiture of contracts with North American retailers. STEA reported last week that most of Swaziland’s 17 textile firms were operating to some extent with nonstriking workers who crossed picket lines. Asian-owned textile plants are also a major industrial presence in Lesotho, Botswana and other countries regionally, with workers’ complaints about low wages, sub-standard working conditions and unfriendly relations with management common. Industry workers are monitoring the Swaziland situation closely. Other than urging strikers to go back to work, government has not intervened.