The City of Mbombela condemns acts of unprovoked misconduct by its employees. During an illegal stand-off earlier today, employees demanded an unplanned meeting with the acting municipal manager, Neil Diamond. On being told that he was attending another meeting, and could not meet them immediately, they resorted to trashing the civic centre, blockaded all entrances into the civic centre and further trashed streets in the CBD. Some employees continued to undermine the rights of those choosing not to participate in the unlawful acts by forcing them out of their work stations.

A number of internal meetings have been held with employees to resolve issues raised with management after the amalgamation of the two disestablished municipalities of Mbombela and Umjindi. Most of the issues centred around the grading of the new entity, the placement process of employees and purported salary disparities of employees performing same duties, to which the management had responded to, indicating that most of them could only be addressed after the conclusion of the placement process.

During the last meeting of the Local Labour Forum, the parties agreed on some matters and deadlocked on others. The City feels betrayed by these acts of the employees. This indicates that the employees are bargaining in bad faith due to the fact that, should they for whatever reason, feel the need for declaring a dispute, due processes through the bargaining council should have been followed.

The municipality would like to put it on record circumventing due process opened the door for acts of criminality. All acts of criminality will be pursued accordingly and that due internal disciplinary processes will also be instituted against those found to have contravened the code of conduct. It is also common course that some did not work today to which the principle of 'no work, no pay' will apply.

Should the employees persist with this line of action, the municipality will put contingency plans in place to continue rendering essential services to the community and minimize disruptions that could be caused. Employees who wish to exercise their right not to participate in these unlawful actions, are also assured that adequate security measures will be in place for their protection and that of municipal assets. Intimidation of working employees will not be tolerated and will lead to disciplinary action against such transgressors.

The City of Mbombela wishes to unequivocally apologize to its rate payers and all citizens alike for the disruption of services and the inconvenience caused by these unprecedented actions.

Issued by City Mbombela / Offices of Acting Municipal Manager, Mr. Neil Diamond
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