* Implats demands would be second pay hike this year
* Lonmin strike rumbles on, workers intimidated by strikers
* Gold Fields’ illegal strike continues
By Sherilee Lakmidas and Ed Stoddard
JOHANNESBURG, Sept 11 (Reuters) – South Africa’s Impala
Platinum faces a second pay bid from miners equal to an
8-10 percent hike granted in April, the world’s No. 2 platinum
producer said on Tuesday, and its shares tumbled on the size of
the latest demand from militant labour.
Unrest has been sweeping South Africa’s bellwether mining
sector with a wave of violence that killed 44 people in August,
including 34 in a hail of police bullets near the Marikana mine
of platinum producer Lonmin .
Implats said on Tuesday the latest pay demand, which it
first disclosed last week but did not detail at the time,
resembled an 8-10 percent hike dished out five months ago to end
a six-week strike.
The company’s share price slid over 5 percent on Tuesday as
investors digested the scale of the pay hikes being sought,
reflecting jitters about high costs and low prices afflicting
the industry in Africa’s largest economy.
There was no end in sight to the month-long strike that has
paralysed Lonmin after thousands of protesters armed with sticks
and machetes marched in a dramatic show of force on Monday,
vowing to hunt down and kill strike-breakers.
Continued…
