Uganda: Strike At Batu Plant

Source from:  New Vision (Kampala) March 11, 2006 James Odomel And Madinah Tebajjukira 03/14/2006

BRITISH American Tobacco's (BATU) green leaf threshing plant operations were disrupted on Thursday, when a section of seasonal workers expressed their dissatisfaction with pay. Clad in pink uniforms, the workers said their allowances from February had been cut off without any reason. They vowed not to work until the management intervenes. BATU head of corporate and regulatory affairs, Jimmy Kiberu said, "The 24-hour continuous load- shedding has reduced the number of hours for leaf processing by two-thirds." He said employees previously worked from Monday to Saturday in two shifts of 12 hours each. "That earned each worker four hours of overtime daily. "But with the current load-shedding schedule, overtime earned has been eroded," Kiberu said. Enditem