20100820
reuters

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South Africa's government offered no new deal in talks on Friday to end a strike by about 1 million civil servants that now looks set to stretch into next week, a union spokesman said.

The state workers' strike started on Wednesday -- the latest in a wave of labour protests since May -- and quickly turned violent, with police firing rubber bullets to disperse protesters blocking roads and preventing patients from entering hospitals.

"There was no new offer," Chris Kloppers, spokesman for the Independent Labour Caucus, said after talks with the government. A public service ministry spokesman would not comment on the discussions.

Any agreement will likely swell state spending by about 1 to 2 percent, forcing the South African government to find funds to pay for the deal as it tries to bring its deficit down from 6.7 percent of gross domestic product.

The government has repeatedly said it cannot afford the more than double inflation wage increase demand from public sector unions. The central bank has warned that a series of above inflation increases so far could fan inflation.

The public services minister told union officials the government wants to use the courts to prevent strikers from attacking and harassing those at places of work after reports of students being assaulted by teachers and doctors blocked from entering clinics, Kloppers said.

Civil servants' unions have taken hits in public opinion after hospital managers attributed several deaths at clinics to the strike and domestic media reported a man with a severed hand being refused treatment at public hospitals because there was no one who could care for him.

South Africa's Health Minister Aaron Motsoaledi joined thousands who volunteered at hospitals to care for the sick and offered harsh words to strikers who were intimidating workers and preventing treatment.