Harare — TELONE workers who have been on strike for the past two weeks have been suspended.

The workers were issued with suspension letters by management on Monday.

TelOne workers downed tools to protest against management's failure to award them a salary increase as recommended by an arbitrator in March.

The workers have since sought help from the Communication and Allied Services Workers' Union of Zimbabwe (CASWUZ).

CASWUZ president Mr Lovemore Matombo said the union had offered an opportunity to TelOne management for dialogue with workers to no avail.

"Instead, workers were given written documents of suspension on Monday because of the industrial action.

"The problem is that TelOne is failing to honour the order by the arbitrator to award workers an increment for the first quarter of the year.

"They promised to review salaries, but up to now nothing has been done," he said.

Mr Matombo said the union had subsequently called for another meeting with TelOne management to discuss the suspension and wage increases to try and reach a consensus.

In a letter dated October 19 and addressed to TelOne managing director Mr Wellington Makamure, Mr Matombo said the CASWUZ national executive had, in a meeting on Tuesday, come up with three recommendations.

One of the recommendations was that despite the pending High Court case, the two parties should embark on negotiations to cushion the workers by addressing the second and third quarter salary reviews.

Efforts to get comment from TelOne were fruitless as the managing director was said to be out of the country while his deputy was said to be busy and could not talk to the Press.