NUM condemns AMCU leader's careless statements

NUM Press Statement, 02 March 2016

NUM condemns AMCU leader's careless statements

The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) has noted unfounded, dirty, dishonest, and shocking allegations made by AMCU President Joseph Mathunjwa a known pathological liar and populist in today's Business Day newspaper in a story titled "Platinum miner faces new costly strike action".

Mathunjwa is quoted saying that Sibanye Gold has signed a wage agreement with a minority union the NUM. "That is the kind of attitude we received with many of these companies, they still feel NUM cannot aborted, it is their baby, so they need to nurture it."

The NUM is the majority union at Sibanye Gold. AMCU is the majority union only at Driefontein. We are the majority union at Beatrix, Kloof, Cook 1, Cook 2, Cook 3 and Cook 4.

The NUM has never been anybody's baby. The NUM is extremely disappointed that the President of a union can make such spurious allegations. Mathunjwa's monstrous lies cannot go unchallenged. He has to consistently lie about the NUM in order to survive in the mining industry. It is his only survival strategy. We want to put it categorically clear that the NUM in its 34 years of existence fought important battles against exploitation and it improved the conditions of employment of mineworkers.The NUM adversary and absolute enemy has always been the monopoly capital, not AMCU.

During the last year gold sector negotiations at the Birchwood Hotel in Boksburg, AMCU spent most of its time shooting a documentary instead of negotiating for its members. They declared the dispute early and spent most their time in their caucus room shooting a documentary. They even filmed inside the plenary knowing that it was not allowed. This pathological liar and the permanent president, membership officer, finance officer, and administrator of AMCU always wants to blame the NUM for everything.

Mathunjwa's carping criticisms generally focus on the NUM instead of the employer. Our biggest challenge is retrenchments. We are worried about our members being retrenched. Retrenchments face us and we are going to fight tooth and nail to make sure that our members and other mineworkers are not retrenched cheaply.

We are calling on mineworkers not be deceived and misled by this pathological liar.

For more information, please contact

Livhuwani Mammburu: Acting NUM National Spokesperson: 083 809 3257

The National Union of Mineworkers
7 Rissik Street.
Cnr Frederick Johannesburg
Tel: 011 377 2111 Cell: 083 809 3257
Twitter: @Num_Media

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/NUM/100860023402167