SWATCAWU CRIES FOUL AS POLICE STOP BUS RANK MEET

MANZINI – The police have stopped a mass meeting that was to be convened by public transport workers in Manzini and SWATCAWU says it would not be responsible for what would happen next.

Public transport workers were supposed to have a mass meeting at the Manzini Bus Rank yesterday at 11.30am where the leadership of the Swaziland Transport Communication and Allied Workers Union (SWATCAWU) was supposed to deliver a 2021 report. Thereafter, the workers would have then mapped a way forward regarding their grievances which they tabled to government in October 2021. SWATCAWU Acting Secretary General Sticks Nkambule said when they were preparing for the meeting; they were invited by the police for a meeting. He said during their meeting, which was held yesterday morning at the Manzini Police Regional Headquarters, the police told them that they had received an instruction that they should not allow the anticipated gathering to take place.

“The police also demanded to see a permit from the Municipal Council of Manzini, which permitted us to meet at the bus rank,” the acting secretary general said.
He said this shocked them because the bus rank was a workplace of the public transport workers. As a result, he said they asked them if they applied for a permit to meet at the police station, which was their workplace. Thereafter, the unionist said they told the police that they should not call them if something happened or if the public transport workers do something. In fact, he said they told the police that they would not be responsible for anything which would happen after the halting of their meeting.

“Our aim was to make the situation better for the workers, government and stakeholders. We wanted to try to control the situation because the workers want answers to their demands,” Nkambule said. He said after tabling the demands to government, the administration set up sub committees to work on them (demands). However, he said until now, they did not have something tangible to give the workers as feedback as the subcommittees had been allegedly making empty promises. Following the fact that the police stopped their meeting, the acting secretary general said they would use other channels to convey the message to the workers and get a mandate from them on what they should do going forward.

On the same note, SWATCAWU President Vusi Nkambule said going into 2022, they wanted to make sure that the workers in the sector were treated like other workers, like being members of the Eswatini National Provident Fund (ENPF) and earn better salaries. Currently, some of the workers in the industry are not members of ENPF and they earn about E2 000 on average. Chief Police Information and Communications Officer Superintendent Phindile Vilakati said the conveners of the meeting did not have a permit. However, it is worth noting that Prince Simelane, the Minister of Housing and Urban Development banned local governments from issuing permits for marches.

Post your comment

Your name:

Your e-mail address:

Add your comments:

Please enter the code you see in the image:

Image:

Code: