SAMWU threatens to bring Johannesburg to a 'standstill'

Municipal workers will bring the Johannesburg CBD to a standstill this week, the SA Municipal Workers' Union said today.

"We expect the town to be standing still; we will fill Simmonds from the top," Gauteng provincial secretary Ntsikelelo Klaas told journalists in Johannesburg.

Municipal workers downed tools on Monday demanding an 18 percent pay rise, with employers, the SA Local Government Association, offering 6.08 percent.

Klaas disputed reports that workers in the province had boycotted the strike over allegations of corruption and were at work across the province.

"Members may be at work but they are not working," he said.

However, the City of Johannesburg reported that 90 percent of its employees were working, with a similar situation in Tshwane.

"In Tshwane members are out, in Ekurhuleni members are out, in Vaal members are out," Klaas said.

He said it was only in Johannesburg where the strike was slow to gain momentum.

"In might be slow in Johannesburg but in Gauteng as a whole, our members are out on strike."

He urged members not to be diverted and said the issues of corruption had to be dealt with separately.

Workers would march for their wage demands and also in protest against the Municipal Amendment Bill, dubbed the Cadres Bill.