The two biggest unions at the Passenger Rail Agency SA (Prasa) are set to hold an urgent meeting with the rail operator’s group CEO, Hishaam Emeran, over what they called a “flawed” retrenchment process affecting more than 600 workers. In a joint statement on Thursday, the United National Transport Union (Untu), the majority union at Prasa, and the rival SA Transport and Allied Workers Union (Satawu), said the scheduled meeting follows the rail operator’s decision to implement a section 189 process affecting the mainline passenger services’ employees. “Prasa has issued retrenchment letters stating the entity’s position to retrench more than 600 workers, a move that labour finds unacceptable and has deemed a jobs bloodbath within the state-owned enterprise (SOE),” the joint statement read. The parastatal incurred irregular expenditure of R3.8bn in 2022/23, earning a qualified audit opinion from the auditor-general for the period. From 2018/19 to 2021/22, the auditor-general issued a disclaimer on its financial statements, which signifies that the accounts cannot be relied on and often suggests the company is in a parlous financial state. “Both unions are scheduled to hold an urgent meeting with the group CEO, Hishaam Emeran ... as an attempt to avoid job losses. Untu and Satawu wish to emphasise that both unions remain aligned regarding the section 189A process in terms of the Labour Relations Act.” Business Day reported recently that labour had rejected moves by Prasa to have the affected employees sign documents issued in relation to the retrenchment process.Untu spokesperson Atenkosi Plaatjie said a facilitation process by the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) was flawed as Prasa’s management “consistently refused to provide labour with critical information requested in an effort to avert this jobs bloodbath”. “This information would make way for a people optimisation process within the rail business where there are currently vacancies. Such organograms should have formed the basis of the consultation process, as they would have assisted in preventing this bloodbath,” Plaatjie said. “Labour repeatedly requested these structures, but they were never provided. This failure has significantly contributed to the process being fundamentally flawed.” Prasa spokesperson Andiswa Makanda has been approached for comment but has yet to respond. Prasa, which has a network of more than 2,000km of track, has historically been plagued by ageing infrastructure, vandalism, unreliability and ineffectiveness, fraud, corruption and safety concerns. The entity launched its general overhaul programme in 2022 at a cost of R7.5bn (of which R3.48bn had been spent by the end of March 2025). The overhaul was established to refurbish and extend the service life of Prasa’s legacy rolling stock fleet — the older Metrorail coaches and mainline passenger services locomotives that serve millions of commuters in South Africa’s metropolitan regions. Prasa said it has grown its ridership from 39.4-million in the 2023/24 financial year to 77-million by last year.