AXED employees of Eskom are demanding answers on why they were fired.
It’s been a week since former cleaners and general workers at Eskom at Megawatt Park, Joburg, picketed outside the premises demanding to know why they were fired without notice.
The over 300 workers said last Monday they were shocked when they saw their names on a list posted on a notice board that their services were no longer required. And when they tried to talk to their employer, who is a sub-contractor to Eskom, he failed to give them conclusive answers.
One cleaner Nthabiseng Baloyi said they told him to wait before he fired them so they could speak to their union. But on Thursday, 1 December, they were shocked when a bus came carrying new cleaners and their access cards were blocked.
“The security said the bus brought new people who will start working, and we are no longer allowed to enter the premises,” she said.
The protesting cleaners then decided to block the entrance, even for the new cleaners to go in. They said they could not be fired without good reason.
On Thursday, 8 December, members of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) picketed outside Eskom headquarters and handed over a memorandum of demands.
Numsa said at least 300 workers, who were employed as cleaners and gardeners, had lost their jobs following the termination of their contract.
Numsa regional secretary Mncedisi Kwababa said the workers were employed by a service provider called Kusile JV and when that contract to provide these services was not renewed, it resulted in workers losing jobs.
“In the past, these workers would have been transferred to the new service provider and absorbed into the business in terms of the transfer process, as captured in section 197 of the Labour relations Act. However, this has not happened.”
Kwababa added that Numsa was of the view that they had been unfairly dismissed.
“Some of these workers have been working at Eskom for nearly 20 years and in all that time, the power utility has not in-sourced them. They have simply been passed from one business to another,” he said.
He further said their demand from Eskom was an immediate reinstatement of all the workers and their benefits, an unconditional apology from the power utility and its related sub-contractors as well as the recognition of Numsa shop stewards and officials as the representatives of the workers.
He said they also wanted an unconditional commitment to in-source all sub-contractor workers, alternatively section 197 being fundamental precondition of any facilities management tender process and the provision of wages and employment conditions that are fair and equitable.
Their memorandum of demands was accepted by Eskom contractors general manager Amos Mboweni, who said they would respond in the next seven working days.
