South Africa strikes called off

Huge marches were held in all of South Africa's major cities

South African public servants have called off two days of strikes they had threatened for this week.

The strikes, planned for Monday and Tuesday, were suspended while union members are consulted on the government's latest pay offer.

This follows what was billed as the biggest strike in South Africa's history, when hundreds of thousands of workers stayed away last Thursday.

The dispute could upset the alliance between unions and the ANC government.

More talks

The government has increased its pay offer to 6.2%, up 0.2%. Eight public sector unions, including those representing teachers, nurses, police officers and prison wardens, were demanding 7%.

For the following two years, the government has offered to increase pay by 0.4% above the rate of inflation.

Unions fall out with the ANC

"We are going to work for two days from Monday and the strike action is off for the moment," Thulas Nxesi, general secretary of the South African Democratic Teachers' Union told AFP news agency.

Government officials welcomed the development.

"We welcome their decision to suspend the strike action. We will return to talks on Wednesday after labour has consulted on the latest draft," Richard Levin, the director general of the department of public services and administration, told Reuters news agency.

South Africa has about 1.1 million public servants, of whom 990,000 are union members.

Unions leaders said that 800,000 workers stayed away from work on Thursday, which Professor Duncan Innes of the University of Witwatersrand says would make it the biggest strike in South Africa's history.

The government says that just 250,000 stayed away.

The BBC's Richard Hamilton in Pretoria says that teachers are the most embittered group as they have not had a pay review since 1996.