SAfrica deploys troops as civil servants strike

JOHANNESBURG, June 8 (Reuters) Uniformed South African soldiers helped doctors tend to patients in the country's biggest hospital today as the government vowed to assert control over a crippling week-old civil servant strike.

''The fact that there is some dissatisfaction here and there cannot mean that the country must grind to a standstill,'' Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota said at Kafalong Hospital in Pretoria, where troops with bullet-proof vests and automatic rifles took up positions outside the gates.

The SAPA news agency said more than 2,500 soldiers were sent to various ''flashpoints'' around the country where striking civil servants have all but paralysed key social services since walking off the job on June 1.

The powerful COSATU labour federation, which includes a number of civil service unions, yesterday said it was urging all of its more than one million members to prepare for a general sympathy strike next Wednesday to push labour's demands.

The government has offered a 6.5 per cent pay hike, but public sector unions have held fast to a demand for 12 per cent, underscoring the ideological battle facing the African National Congress as it prepares to elect a new leader in December.

The unions -- traditional allies of the ANC during the long fight against apartheid -- are now increasingly vocal critics of President Thabo Mbeki's government, charging that its business friendly policies have left millions behind.

South Africa's central bank, battling surging inflation, fears a high wage settlement will further add to price pressures in Africa's biggest economy.

Frustrations were palpable at the sprawling Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital in Soweto township, where soldiers with automatic rifles slung over their shoulders joined efforts to keep essential services running.

Some helped overwhelmed doctors move patients on trolleys to casualty wards as policemen stood guard at the main entrance. Only emergency cases were allowed to enter.

''Most of our nurses didn't turn up for work this morning so our wards are operating on very very skeleton staff,'' Hester van den Heever,'' a hospital spokeswoman.

''Only critical and emergency doctors are here and they're working flat out at the moment. The soldiers and police have been great.

INTIMIDATION AND CLASHES The government has reacted sharply to reports that some union leaders intimidated civil servants who chose not to participate in the strike, noting that it has obtained a court order barring workers in ''essential services'' such as hospitals and prisons from walking off the job.

Nevertheless, many schools and hospitals around the country remain with only skeleton staffing, and there have been increasing incidents of clashes between strikers and police seeking to preserve access to government facilities.

The SABC said Lekota and other ministers were jeered by strikers as they arrived under heavy guard at Kafalong to promote the government's new show of force against the unions.

''We are there to protect people, we are there to ensure there is no intimidation, we are there to make sure that those who want to go to work, go to work, even if necessary to use any methods to ensure they do that,'' Police Commissioner Jackie Selebi said.

But many public service workers said they were unwilling to risk returning to work without guarantees of safety. But it appears the standoff is wearing down some of them.

''It is our wish that government and our unions come to an agreement but until they do that we will be doing this day to day,'' said Lorma a union leader at the Baragwanath hospital.

''We are not stopping anyone from getting in. We are allowing them to pass and get in but the security are blocking them from getting into the hospital.

In coastal KwaZulu-Natal province, many ambulance drivers stopped responding to calls because they were afraid for their safety and hospitals were not accepting patients anyway.

''What is the point of us picking up patients if we cannot take them to any hospital. We are being forced to abandon them,'' one driver told the SAPA news agency.

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