Updates
CWAO Radio Updates bring weekly, relevant news to you as a worker – from rights to strikes, legislation to campaigns, and everything else affecting the working class.
How government is trying to cut public service jobs
The government is trying to entice public servants over the age of 55 to take early retirement as part of its austerity measures. More details are expected in the National Budget speech. But at what cost?
Vegetable farm workers win at CCMA
ZGG farmworkers celebrate after winning yet another case at the CCMA against their employer in a series of battles since 2023. Anchor: Muzi Mzoyi Guests: Joshua Hlungwa; Phineas Ngobeni Credits: Produced and Engineered by Muzi Mzoyi; Edited by Charles Leonard Recorded in February 2025
Bosses going after their own foreign workers
Employers are using the lack of work permits to victimise their own foreign national workers who dare stand up for their rights. This is happening even though the Labour Relations Act also applies to migrants, even if they don’t have a valid work permit.
Premier Mister sweet dismiss more than 100 workers
In Buwa Basebetsi update this week: We look at the story of 110 Premier Mister Sweet Workers dismissed in January for taking part in a strike in 2024
Updates: End of Mr Sweet strike
Workers at the Mister Sweet confectionery factory in Wadeville, Gauteng, began a strike on 19 August, which ended 11 weeks later. The company is owned by Premier FMCG, one of the oldest food and consumer packaged goods businesses in South Africa. Premier FMCG’s chief executive officer, Kobus Gertenbach, earns R18.8…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Labour Rights Week
A five-day Labour Rights workshop for activists on the frontline of defending workers was hosted in Joburg. Hosted by the CWAO and Foundation for Human Rights, this five-day workshop is for activists (Human Rights Defenders) from 30 organisations who are all on the frontline of defending workers against exploitation and…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Labour Law Amendment Bill
On the 9th of October 2024, the Department of Employment & Labour issued a press statement where they shared their readiness of their inspectors to be deployed to enforce another “wave” of labour law amendments. Muzi Mzoyi sat down with John Appolis of the Casual Workers Advice Office, who broke…
Buwa Basebetsi: Woolies boss was paid 1,300 times as much as a shop floor worker
Here are two unsettling facts apparently meant to assure us that the market for labour is working well. A shop floor worker at Woolworths would have had to work for more than three years to earn as much money as the group’s CEO Roy Bagattini made in one day.
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mr Sweet Protest - Two months into strike
This week marks the 9th week since the start of Mister Sweet strike. On the 19th of August Workers at Mister Sweet went on strike demanding a R19000 basic salary as their main bone of content, but there are more issues than what meets the eye as we previously reported…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Salga, unions’ five-year wage deal locks workers into poverty
The first indications of what life will be like for public sector workers under the Government of National Unity (GNU) can arguably be seen in the pioneering five-year salary and wage agreement that was recently signed by municipal unions and the municipalities.
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mr Sweet Protest - A worker's story
This week marks the 8th week since the start of Mister Sweet strike. On the 19th of August Workers at Mister Sweet went on strike demanding a R19000 basic salary as their main bone of content, but there are more issues than what meets the eye as we previously reported…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: ZGG foreign national workers barred from work
ZGG a vegetable and flowers farm west of Johannesburg has ordered 37 of its foreign national employees to stop coming to work if they do not have work permits or Asylum Seekers documents. They have been given two weeks or kiss their jobs a goodbye. This is even though some…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mr Sweet Protest - Latest Press Statement
We, the 25 social movements listed below, from six provinces across South Africa, hereby announce that we will ramp up our boycott of Mister Sweet products. Collectively, we are alarmed and dismayed at the highly abusive behaviour of Mister Sweet against the workers who have been on strike since 19…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mr Sweet Protest - Latest Press Statement
We, the 25 social movements listed below, from six provinces across South Africa, hereby announce that we will ramp up our boycott of Mister Sweet products. Collectively, we are alarmed and dismayed at the highly abusive behaviour of Mister Sweet against the workers who have been on strike since 19…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Namibia Blocks Ship
Today we’ll be looking at an article published by BBC News titled Namibia blocks ship over Israel war concerns. A vessel suspected by the Namibian authorities to be carrying military cargo intended for Israeli use in the ongoing war in Gaza has been blocked from docking in the southern African…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Farm Workers March against pesticides
In today's episode we’ll be looking at an article by Ashraf Hendricks published in GroundUp titled Farm workers march in rain and wind to call for ban on pesticides. More than 150 mostly women farm workers and supporters braved gale force winds and heavy rainfall to march through the streets…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mr Sweet Protest - Injured Workers
The SWF has been informed that several casual workers have been seriously injured over the past week in the Mister Sweet factory after Mister Sweet bosses put pressure on them to handle dangerous and unfamiliar machinery. Mister Sweet has also allegedly breached s17 of the Occupational Health and Safety Act…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mister Sweet Protest - Week 4
The Mister Sweet strike is in its fourth week and is taking its toll on striking workers. From the 19th of August workers have been demanding R19 500 as their basic salary, but their employer is sticking to their 7% increase across the board. This is despite Mister Sweet being…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mr Sweet Protest - Labour Court victory
The Simunye Workers Forum union has defeated Mister Sweet's attempts to bring an interdict against the strike at its factory in Johannesburg which began on 19 August. Johannesburg Labour Court judge J Daniels recently ruled that the employer was unable to show any link between the alleged violence they complained…
Buwa Basebetsi Updates: Mr Sweet Protest - Actions of Solidarity
In this episode of Buwa Basebetsi Updates, we highlight the messages of solidarity towards the protesting Mr Sweet striking workers.