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The Freight Community’s Weekly Newspaper for Import / Export decision makers – on subscription
FRIDAY 23 April 2010 NO. 1907
TFR strike called off … after a week of chaos By Alan Peat A week-long strike at Transnet Freight Rail (TFR), which started on April 8, caused “chaos” on the JohannesburgDurban container rail route, according to Lawrie Bateman, MD of MSC Logistics. When he talked to FTW on April 15, his company had 600 boxes stuck in Johannesburg because empty wagons had not been returned from Durban, and he estimated that 1 200 containers were awaiting uplift at the Port of Durban. Eddie McGregor of Grindrod Intermodal confirmed that things had “begun to clog up” in Durban. “With containers not being offloaded at Durban,” he said, “the wagons can’t be turned around and sent back to Gauteng.” On Friday of last week Bateman said that although
“alleging that the relationships between the manager and their members had broken down.” The issue had arisen early in March, according to Dlamini, when Satawu members submitted a petition to local management demanding the removal of the manager. At two meetings on March 16 and March 25, the union presented a list of issues in support of their demand. “ As these issues were unsubstantiated allegations,” Dlamini said, “management responded by proposing an independent investigator to be appointed jointly to investigate the allegations and establish whether there were any irregularities on the part of the manager in the execution of his duties. Management further suggested that the outcome of the investigation would To page 12
MSC had got a couple of its trains through, there were still other trains stacked up at Kings Rest, unable to get into the marshalling yard at the Port of Durban. TFR’s communiqué of that day carried the following bad news: “Currently there are 483 x 20-foot and 408 x 40-ft import containers still to be railed. “Msc Nefeli is in port with 200 x 20-ft empty containers to City Deep still to be discharged. “Trains at Kings Rest – 16 trains, 662 containers.” Selby Dlamini, communications and media manager at TFR in Durban, told FTW that the “legal strike” had been called by the SA Transport & Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) members who were employed by TFR Durban operations. “They are demanding the removal of the local employee relations manager,” he added,
The Jet set touches down at Ortia
Alex Cost (left), GM Africa, and Nikos Kardassis, CEO Jet Airways, were all smiles after the airline's inaugural flight last week.
The arrival of the first Jet Airways flight at OR Tambo last Thursday (April 14) marked the start of the airline’s daily services between Mumbai and Johannesburg. “Over the past few years South African companies have been actively looking for opportunities in India and some large Indian companies are already
invested here,” CEO Nikos Kardassis told FTW on his arrival. “We believe a daily scheduled service will facilitate growing trade.” Arindam Banerji, senior general manager: cargo, said recently that while Jet Airways was primarily a passenger airline, its aim was to see at least 20% of revenue generated from cargo.
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