NUM is surprised and shocked by the developments at Eskom

The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) is surprised and shocked by  the suspensions of the four executives at Eskom.

"It means that there is a collapse of governance. We would have expected the chairperson of the board to be fired. We did raise a concern about the reinstatement of this chairperson when the new board [had] been established.We reject the suspensions of the four executive because we were never consulted. We think that there is a bigger picture rather than to gun for these four executives," said NUM General Secretary Frans Baleni.

"The timing is also bad because we had just made a call for Save Eskom Campaign doing things differently including the involvement of labour. Couldn't there be a better approach to dealing with the concerns they are having. Nobody is saying somebody is corrupt or abused the resources. Government must also take responsibility rather than penalise certain individuals," Baleni added.

The NUM reiterates its initial position to push for a Save Eskom Campaign. Part of the campaign will be to ensure that the voices of the workers are embraced in any turn-around strategy by the company. We believe that it will be a grave mistake for workers not to be consulted in generating the improvement of the parastatal.

Statement issued by Frans Baleni: NUM General Secretary, March 12 2015

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