Election promises broken, say temporary employees

[caption id="attachment_38805" align="alignright" width="300"] WORK PLEASE: Workers of the Expanded Public Works Programme toyi-toyi yesterday Picture: MORNE DU RANDT[/caption]

A LARGE group of orange overall-clad temporary Public Works Department employees protested outside a Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality building yesterday where they demanded an extension to their employment contracts and permanent work.

About 100 protesters, mostly young women, sang and chanted outside the Lillian Diedricks building in Govan Mbeki Avenue from early yesterday. They said they had been promised that their contracts would be extended to five years.

The protesters were employed by the Public Works Department as part of the Expanded Public Works Programme (EPWP) and had been tasked with labour such as street cleaning in dozens of wards across the metro since February. They claimed that their contracts were cancelled about two weeks ago. - Shaun Gillham and Chanice Koopman