Trade union, Solidarity says it will meet with Sasol management to express its unhappiness about a requirement that workers at its Secunda plant in Mpumalanga must be vaccinated against COVID-19 or they must produce a negative test every seven days.

The requirement is for around 20 000 workers who are scheduled to take part in the annual maintenance work of the petrochemicals plant which produces fuel from coal. Workers who choose not to be vaccinated will have to pay for their own weekly COVID-19 test which is said to cost around R850.

Solidarity spokesperson, Riaan Visser says the requirement is tantamount to making workers pay for the slow pace of the government vaccine rollout programme.

In related news, the Mpumalanga government partnered with Sasol last month to vaccinate over 8 000 employees and service providers in Secunda.