By: Hertha Ekandjo
174 Basil Read Mining company employees are planning to down their tools on 3 October and vent their frustrations over unpaid overtime wages dating between 2014-2016.
According to the workers’ representative, Jonny Classen, they’ve been fighting for eight years for what the company owes to them, with no success. He says the company owes the 174 employees around N$95 million.
The workers further expressed dissatisfaction with their union, the Mine Workers Union (MUN) and the Labour Ministry, as they allegedly failed them on multiple occasions in regards to the case.
Classen accused the union of taking sides with the company and ignoring the workers’ complaints.
“The company had applied for declaration of continuous operations in 2014 to 2016, where we had to work overtime. We had to work 12 hours of which three hours were overtime and one hour for lunch.”
“The issue then is, this overtime, we were never paid. We complained to the labour ministry in 2016 up until now we were never paid,” Classen stressed.
According to him, they have exhausted all options, including the Ombudsman, the ACC, and even escalated to up the the Office of the President.
“Nothing has been done to come to our rescue. The company owes us a lot, including unlawful retrenchment,” said Classen.
With the upcoming demonstration however, the workers said they will be handing over their petition to the mine workers union.
He added the labour ministry and MUN abandoned them, because they are allegedly aware of documents from the Basil Read Mining company’s head office in South Africa, stating that the workers should be paid what is owed to them.The ministry allegedly refused to intervene in the matter.
Classen stated the head office has not been a problem but that the Basil Read country office is the refusing party.
Meanwhile, MUN’s George Amupweya told The Villager that they as the union have tried their best in dealing with this case and have placed the matter into the hands of lawyers.
However, Amupweya had also made it clear that the employees at some point had told the union to back off their case, as they have allegedly handed the issue over to members of the Landless People Members (LPM).
“The matter is at the High Court; we have appointed lawyers that are dealing with the matter. We don’t have lawyers that can argue at court in our office, so we appointed lawyers for these employees,” he explained.
The union mentioned the matter keeps being postponed at court, coercing the aggrieved workers delegate the members of the political party.
Amupweya also stated the employees at some point wrote an email to the union requesting the union to stay away from the case because they are “slow”.
“The matter is currently at court level, we represented the matter at the labour commissioner and it is unfortunate that the court keeps postponing the matter.”
“The company is contending that they don’t not owe anything to the workers. It’s unfortunate that the unions don’t argue at court level,” Amupweya clarified.
Amupweya further said the company had contended that the union’s claims were unreasonable and that they had paid to the workers what was owed to them.
“When the employees’ contract got terminated, the company then initiated a retrenchment process. One of the many other payments that were due to the employees apart from the sovereign payment was the part of the overtime payment. The company contended and said they have been paying the employees correctly,” said Amupweya.
According to him, the Union received a legal opinion regarding the matter, which proved that the company has paid the employees correctly and has no money due to the them.
Meanwhile, labour expert Herbert Jauch said it is disappointing to hear such unfortunate news, adding that this behaviour is against the labour act.
“It really is a shock to even believe that it is possible for a company to continuously not pay overtime when the labour act is so clear on its definition on what overtime is.”
“For a company to not pay overtime it is clear violation of the act,” said Jauch.
According to him, when such an incident takes place the affected employees and their union should immediately launch a case of unfair labour practices and a violation of the workers’ rights with the office of the labour commissioner.
He further mentioned the office of the labour commissioner is expected to solve the matter quickly, usually within a few months through arbitration.
“With the fact that the case ended up at court, it is clear that the labour system is not working. And the company is completely stubborn about not being compliant.”
“Seeing that the matter is to court, gives a clear indication that the previous steps taken could not resolve the issue,” he said.
When The Villager reached out to Labour Minister Uutoni Nujoma and the ministry executive director, their phones went unanswered. Calls to Basil Read also went unanswered.
