The Northern Rhodesia Mine Workers' Union (NRMU) was a

trade union A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...

which existed in

Northern Rhodesia Northern Rhodesia was a British protectorate in Southern Africa, now the independent country of Zambia. It was formed in 1911 by Amalgamation (politics), amalgamating the two earlier protectorates of Barotziland-North-Western Rhodesia and North ...

between 1936 and 1964. It represented blue-collar, European workers in the copper mining industry.

History

The NRMU was founded in 1936 by Charles Harris, the General Secretary of the Mine Workers' Union, as a local branch of the South African union. Frank Maybank was the general secretary of NRMU. It was soon discovered that the constitution of the South African union did not allow branches to be formed outside of the country, and the branch separated to form an independent Northern Rhodesian body. The mining companies were initially reluctant to negotiate with the new union, however the

Colonial Office The Colonial Office was a government department of the Kingdom of Great Britain and later of the United Kingdom, first created in 1768 from the Southern Department to deal with colonial affairs in North America (particularly the Thirteen Colo ...

, concerned by the threat of a strike, instructed the mining companies to recognize the union if it could recruit over 55 percent of the European mineworkers. The union achieved recognition in September 1937. The union established branches at

Broken Hill Broken Hill is a city in the Far West (New South Wales), far west region of outback New South Wales, Australia. An inland mining city, it is near the border with South Australia on the crossing of the Barrier Highway (A32) and the Silver City Hi ...

, Roan Antelope,

Mufulira Mufulira is a town in the Copperbelt Province of Zambia. Mufulira means "Place of Abundance and Peace". The town developed around the Mufulira Copper Mine in the 1930s. The town also serves as the administrative capital of Mufulira District. G ...

Nkana Nkana is a section of the city of Kitwe, Copperbelt Province, Zambia which started off in the early part of the 20th century as a railway station to support the growing complex of copper mining operations. It was named after Chief Nkana, the lo ...

and Nchanga, however it struggled to recruit members, and by 1939 membership had fallen to 1,000 out of 2,500 eligible European mineworkers. The main priorities of the union in its early years was to increase its membership and restrict the supply of labour to the mining companies in order to strengthen the bargaining position of the miners. This second objective was threatened by the abundant supply of cheap labour from the local African population. In order to counteract this the union adopted a principle of 'equal pay for equal work', meaning that no Africans would be employed for less than an equivalent European employee. In practice, as the mining companies were not willing to pay European wages to African employees, this meant restricting the employment of African workers in jobs occupied by Europeans. In March 1940 NRWU launched a strike, which trigged a separate protest movement amongst African workers. In 1942 Maybank was deported from Rhodesia due to his activism. He was not allowed to return to the Copperbelt until the end of the

Second World War World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

References

{{Reflist Mining trade unions Trade unions in Zambia Defunct trade unions of Africa Trade unions established in 1936 Trade unions disestablished in 1964