Luanshya miners back to work as management u-turns on sackings

Reuters report that workers at Luanshya Copper Mines (LCM) have ended their six-day strike once management reinstated sacked workers. LCM sacked 1,000 workers for striking ‘illegally’, but continued solidarity action by colleagues forced a management u-turn on the issue, and a re-opening of negotiations on wages. Miners at MCM and LCM are both now back at work, still demanding 40% pay hikes, and expecting management to show greater flexibility from their original offers of 14% and 18% respectively.

Striking legally is almost impossible given Zambia’s current labour laws, so most action is taken informally by workers rather than through the main unions who lead negotiations. The UNDP and ILO also both today called for an increase in Zambia’s minimum wage and reform of antiquated labour legislation. UNDP country representative Aeneas Chuma is quoted in The Post newspaper proposing that minimum wages are pegged to the country’s ‘food basket’. The current Government Central Statistics Office (CSO) food basket sits at K713,507, while the minimum wage is just K268,000. Influential NGO The Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection (JCTR) contests the basis of the CSO calculations and their focus on just food rather than basic needs, including school fees and clothes. JCTR advocate pegging minimum wages to their own ‘basic needs basket’ which currently sits at 1,543,650.