DURBAN UNIVERSITY OF TECHNOLOGY STATUS REPORT
22 FEBRUARY 2018
1. BACKGROUND
Several engagements among Management, the Chair of Council, the NEHAWU provincial leadership and the Unions took place between 12 and 14 February 2018.
The Vice Chancellor, Prof Mthembu presented recommendations to the EXCO of Council on the way forward for Unions to suspend or end the strike and for both parties to resume negotiations under a new framework that could guarantee all parties rational and objective outcomes.
2. ENGAGEMENT BETWEEN MANAGEMENT AND THE UNIONS: 12 – 14 February 2018
Given that no engagements had taken place since Thursday, 8 February 2018 when the CCMA mediation fell apart, on Monday, 12 February 2018, the Vice Chancellor (VC) arranged a meeting with the Chairs of the Unions. In the past, such meetings were very effective in helping negotiating parties to reach a settlement, as in the last case, in January 2017, for the previous year’s salary increases.
On 12 Feb 2018, acknowledging that one-on-one internal DUT negotiations had failed and that the CCMA’s mediation had also failed, the VC indicated that the negotiating parties needed to establish a new framework akin to arbitration. The Union Chairs promised to engage on this proposal. However, in anticipation of a meeting with the Chair of Council & the KZN provincial NEHAWU leadership the following day (13 Feb 2018), they withheld their formal response to the proposal.
On Tuesday, 13 February 2018, the Unions marched to the Vice-Chancellor’s Office to submit a memorandum. Unfortunately, he was not in the office at that time and they refused to hand the memorandum to Dr Machi, the Deputy Vice-Chancellor: People and Operations. They then made an arrangement to return on Wednesday, 14 February 2018 to hand the memorandum to the VC, at about 11h00.
The Tuesday, 13 February 2018 ‘strategic’ meeting between the Chair of Council and mainly the provincial leadership of Nehawu, led by Mr Phakama Ndunakazi, the Provincial Secretary (with other Unions represented by 2 persons each) took place in the evening on Tuesday, 13 February 2018. The purpose of the meeting was to break the current deadlock reached after the CCMA mediation process, by finding strategic ways to suspend the strike and to resume negotiations. This was, in essence, to happen without turning the meeting into a negotiation session.
In short, the following was agreed upon at the 13 Feb 2018 meeting:
- The Unions were to consider suspending the strike so that a more conducive environment for further
negotiations would be created. In this regard, the Unions would make a submission to Management with
their own proposals on what they envisage the trade-offs to be that could be sought from the EXCO of Council. - Negotiations would resume provided a new framework for them would be agreed among the principals (Council in case of Management and the provincial leadership in case of NEHAWU). Such a framework would be managed by an expert or a team of experts or a reputable organisation well versed with the university and arbitration systems.
- Both parties (Management and the Unions) were urged to desist from publishing media statements and engaging in related activities that sour the safe negotiation space being created.
As noted above, the Unions had scheduled a submission of a memorandum to the VC at 11h00 on Wednesday, 14 February 2018. In the spirit of the 13 February 2018 meeting with the Chair of Council (especially the third bullet above), it was anticipated that the march would be reconsidered and personal attacks in posters would be avoided. However, that was not to be. The memorandum simply called for urgent resumption of negotiations.
During the delivery of the memorandum, the VC asked the Chairs of the Unions to meet him urgently so that they could deal with all resolutions of the 13 February 2018 meeting. It should be noted that on Monday, 12 February 2018, the VC had a similar meeting with the Unions. But, this time, they refused to meet the VC without two or three other Unions representatives. There were other delays, which led to the meeting not sitting. With the difficulty of having a face-to-face meeting with the Unions, the VC sent a letter [Annexure 1] to them requesting a response [Annexure 2]. Essentially, the content of the Unions response was as follows:
- It raised a new demand as trade-off for suspending the strike: that the no-work-no-pay principle should
NOT be applied in toto. This was contrary to the agreement reached at the Chair of Council’s meeting
of 13 February 2018 that such discussions on the principle could only take place once the negotiations
resumed. - Contrary to the agreement of principal’s meeting of 13 February 2018; that a different framework for
negotiations be agreed, they suggested that such a framework be negotiated at the first negotiation
session between the two teams. However, such a framework would have to be designed and owned
by the principals.
3. DEVELOPMENST SINCE 16 FEBRUARY 2018
3.1 On 16 February 2018, due to continuing staff strike and its unintended impact on the academic
programme, the Executive Committee of Senate (Senex) resolved to suspend the academic programme
until further notice.
3.2 Salaries of the striking staff have been docked, DUT’s pay day is the 20th. Sadly, there were errors, as
some non-striking staff’s salaries were also not paid. The Human Resources Department is currently
working on resolving errors, a matter that should be resolved in the next few days.
3.3 The Deputy Minister of the Department of Higher Education and Training requested a meeting with
the VC, offering to intervene towards resolving the staff strike. However, as the matter had been
escalated to the two principals referred to above, the intervention was not possible.
3.4 Persuaded by seeking to explore other avenues towards resolving the strike, on 21 February 2018 the
Chair of Council officially abandoned a process cited above that had been agreed upon with the
NEHAWU regional office Secretary. This was a sad eventuality; following repeated reminders to the
Secretary to participate in fresh negotiations that were not successful.
3.5 On 21 February 2018, DUT experienced a student unrest; subsequently an Executive Management team led by the VC met the SRC. A number of the concerns and proposals made by the SRC are currently
being attended to and/or considered by the DUT Management and Chair of Council.
4. STUDENT REGISTRATIONS
The University is open and the registrations are continuing. As of Tuesday, 20 February 2018, we have registered 22 797 out of the 28 689 students planned for 2018. The following statistics presents more details, in comparison to 2017 at the same time.
5. COUNCIL AND MANAGEMENT RECOMMENDATIONS GOING FORWARD
Cognizant of the salary stalemate Management has put forward various recommendations to EXCO and below is the envisaged way forward:
- The EXCO of Council is determined to revive fresh engagement between management and the Unions through a new framework akin to arbitration, for negotiations that will produce a rational and an
objective outcome. Further, that by the beginning of the week-starting 26 February 2018, an expert, or
team of experts or an organisation be identified for this purpose so that negotiations could start. - To facilitate the above process, EXCO of Council has requested Management to advise the Deputy
Minister of Higher Education and Training that the Intervening Period by the principals i.e. Chair of
Council and the provincial Leadership of NEHAWU has not been successful and has been abandoned. To further request that the earlier contemplated intervention by the Deputy Minister can now resume. - The above two processes are not mutually exclusive but rather complementary.
Chairperson of Council
