Thousands of commuters around the Makhado area were left stranded since last Friday as bus drivers went on strike due to a national wage dispute.

The South African Transport and Allied Workers' Union (Satawu) announced a nationwide strike last week as a result of a deadlock in wage negotiations. Workers were demanding an 18% increase in wages, while employers were offering 6.5%.

The bus strike came as a blow to thousands of cash-strapped local consumers. Many of them had already paid for their monthly bus tickets and battled to try and find extra money to pay for taxis.

Maitele Madzunga is one of the stranded commuters who now have to queue for taxis. "We are always forced to queue for an hour before a taxi arrives to pick us up at the taxi rank. We have tried to talk to taxi owners about our frustrations, but nothing is happening." Maitele complained that he could not go to work as he did not have money to pay for a connecting trip.

“I am not opposed to the strike, but I am worried about the way it took place. They should have told us that they will not transport us, so that we could have arranged alternative transport. Now we do not have money and we are marked as being absent from work, but we are sympathetic to the cause of the drivers,” he said.

Satawu's provincial coordinator, Sam Lefuwa, said that they would only go back to work after an agreement was reached with the workers. In reaction to the no-work-no-pay policy, Lefuwa said the language used to explain the Labour Relations Act was very clear, that as long as they had the right to strike, it remained at the discretion of the employer to implement the no-work-no-pay  rule.

He accused the bus owners of using the rule to scare off the striking drivers. "We view it as a bold statement to scare our members, but we are determined to suffer until our demands are met," he said.

One of the bus drivers, Mr Dickson Mashele, said they worked under trying conditions and they were not well compensated, which left them and their families to suffer. “We have voiced our challenges in a peaceful and honourable way, but it fell on deaf ears as employers do not want to listen to us. We have decided that enough is enough and we will not go back to work if they do not reply to our demands,” he said.

The chairperson of Vhembe Bus Operators, Mr Livhuwani Madzuse, said that a no-work-no-pay policy was in place. "We are not going to pay them for the times they were not in the workplace."

Madzuse said that commuters who had bought tickets would receive a discount when they bought tickets for the next month. He said that commuters had to produce the previous month's ticket when they went to buy a new ticket.