* Amplats says industry in financial distress
* Says can’t negotiate with strikers in climate of ‘anarchy’
By Olivia Kumwenda
JOHANNESBURG, Nov 1 (Reuters) – South Africa’s platinum
industry is in “severe financial distress” and high wage
settlements to get wildcat strikers back to work will lead to
job cuts, Anglo American Platinum said.
The world’s top platinum producer said it was losing
production averaging 3,694 ounces of platinum per day due to a
strike at its South African operations that is in its seventh
week. To date 141,640 ounces of the precious metal have been
lost.
“This is completely the wrong time to be offering
unsustainable wage increases that the moment people are back at
work you just have to (lay off) a whole lot of people,” the
firm’s chief executive Chris Griffith told Talk Radio 702 On
Thursday.
“There will be implications for jobs,” he said adding that
Amplats could not “negotiate in a climate of anarchy”.
Amplats parent company Anglo American has already
placed its four Rustenburg mines “under review” –
management-speak for their possible closure.
Layoffs in the mining industry were a prime factor behind a
rise in unemployment in the third quarter that left more than
one in four of the labour force out of work.
Continued…
