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Thursday September 13, 9:29 PMStrike halts output at SAfrica Volkswagen unitJOHANNESBURG, Sept 13 (Reuters) - Volkswagen AG's South African unit (VWSA) stopped vehicle production at its main plant in the country and sent home most of its 4,000 workers due to a strike over wages by metal workers, it said on Thursday.Volkswagen said it had shut its Uitenhage Plant and sent home most of its production employees as a result of the strike by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa in the motor and component sector, which started on Wednesday. Volkswagen said the Uitenhage plant, located near the city of Port Elizabeth in the Eastern Cape Province, has a capacity to manufacture 600 cars a day. "This strike action by NUMSA at most of our supplier plants (is) already having a dramatic impact on the local automobile manufacturing industry and will threaten jobs and export orders in the future," Brian Smith, VWSA's Human Resources Director, said. NUMSA spokesman Mziwakhe Hlangani said more than 50,000 workers had downed tools since Wednesday and operations in around 10,000 auto sector firms had been impacted. NUMSA is the biggest union in the automobile industry. He said workers were demanding a 9 percent increase in wages across the board, against offers ranging between 7.5 and 8 percent offered to a different category of workers by the auto firms, which are negotiating under an umbrella body. DaimlerChrysler , BMW , General Motors , Nissan , Ford , Toyota and India's Tata all make cars in South Africa. They employ about 39,000 workers. |
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