Union blasts government for paying Cubans while Denel employees aren’t paid
The Uasa trade union has blasted the South African government for spending a significant sum of taxpayers’ money on employing Cuban ‘service providers’ over the last few years, instead of using it to save the jobs of South African engineers. In its statement, the union said it was “infuriated” and “sickened” to discover that the South African National Defence Force had paid the Cubans more than R1-billion during this period.
“State-owned enterprise (SOE) Denel is in dire financial straits,” highlighted Uasa. “Due to budget cuts, government is failing to step in and save the enterprise and the jobs of those employed there but engineers from Cuba have been getting paid.”
The union described the payments made to the Cubans as “exorbitant”. The government, it asserted, was maintaining good relations with Cuba “at the cost” of qualified South African engineers.
Uasa had been fighting for its members at Denel and seeking to save the defence industrial group for some time. The union pointed out that the crisis at the SOE had also hit small businesses that were service providers to Denel, because the SOE had been unable to pay them and now owed millions of rands to its suppliers.
“South Africa’s government needs to take care of its own citizens and patriotic taxpayers before outsourcing key projects worth billions to foreign companies whilst we have capacity within our country where people are willing and able to do the job,” asserted Uasa.
Comments
Research Reports
Latest Multimedia
Showroom
Immersive Technologies is the world's largest, proven and tested supplier of simulator training solutions to the global resources industry.
VISIT SHOWROOM
Press Office
Announcements
What's On
Subscribe to improve your user experience...
Option 1 (equivalent of R125 a month):
Receive a weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine
(print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
Receive daily email newsletters
Access to full search results
Access archive of magazine back copies
Access to Projects in Progress
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format
Option 2 (equivalent of R375 a month):
All benefits from Option 1
PLUS
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports, in PDF format, on various industrial and mining sectors
including Electricity; Water; Energy Transition; Hydrogen; Roads, Rail and Ports; Coal; Gold; Platinum; Battery Metals; etc.
Already a subscriber?
Forgotten your password?
Receive weekly copy of Creamer Media's Engineering News & Mining Weekly magazine (print copy for those in South Africa and e-magazine for those outside of South Africa)
➕
Recieve daily email newsletters
➕
Access to full search results
➕
Access archive of magazine back copies
➕
Access to Projects in Progress
➕
Access to ONE Research Report of your choice in PDF format
RESEARCH CHANNEL AFRICA
R4500 (equivalent of R375 a month)
SUBSCRIBEAll benefits from Option 1
➕
Access to Creamer Media's Research Channel Africa for ALL Research Reports on various industrial and mining sectors, in PDF format, including on:
Electricity
➕
Water
➕
Energy Transition
➕
Hydrogen
➕
Roads, Rail and Ports
➕
Coal
➕
Gold
➕
Platinum
➕
Battery Metals
➕
etc.
Receive all benefits from Option 1 or Option 2 delivered to numerous people at your company
➕
Multiple User names and Passwords for simultaneous log-ins
➕
Intranet integration access to all in your organisation
