By: Fransina Nghidengwa
Former Air Namibia employees want parliament to summon stakeholders, such as government and the liquidators, to explain the delays in paying their severance packages among other concerns.
Last week Thursday, the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Human Resources and Community Development held a consultative meeting with the former employees of the defunct national airline.
The meeting was a sequel to two petitions received from the disgruntled employees of the national airline that has gone out of business.
On 11 February 2021, the government announced the immediate shutdown and liquidation of Air Namibia due to overwhelming debt and years of financial dependence from the state. At the time of closure, the airline operated nine aircraft and employed about 600 staff.
According to their representative Renier Bougard, repeated attempts to seek an audience with stakeholders have not yielded any positive results and the ex-employees followed all channels for more than two years without no solution.
“We feel neglected. Minister Iipumbu Shiimi said his office doors are open but our numerous calls to his office seeking an appointment have been received with excuses. We request an urgent engagement with the Minister’s office and we want the liquidators of Air Namibia to be summoned as well as other stakeholders such as the Namibia Financial Institutions Supervisory Authority (Namfisa), Ministry of Justice, the Master of the High Court and the Namibia Revenue Agency (NamRA),” he said.
Bougard said the liquidators changed the terms and conditions agreed upon under oath. They went to parliament to say what has happened and the full amount has not been paid and asked them as lawmakers to make the liquidators pay the rest of the money. However, they responded claiming they cannot do so because they first need to consult them.
“We waited for eight months just for a two-hour meeting to give through our information and now we have to maybe wait for another eight months to get feedback,” he said.
Bougard lamented some former Air Namibia employees are losing properties while others pushed by desperation, have taken their own lives,
“It is clear the government does not care and the parliamentary committee made it clear to us that they are just parliament and that they do not make decisions but only recommendations,” he added.
Bougard further claimed the Ministry of Justice and Masters of the High Court do not understand the legalities of it because it is the first time there is liquidation [of a parastatal].
“We the former workers are now having to go through this process and while we are following the processes because we do not want other parastatals to go through what we are going through now,” he said.
He further added they asked the parliamentary committee to summon the liquidators because they do not want to speak to them.
The ex-employees are also unhappy that parliament had not urgently looked into their plight despite receiving the initial petition. They also implored lawmakers to intervene as they have no other means of earning a living.
Among a host of issues, the ex-employees intend to discuss tax exemptions on their severance packages and a request for 30% interest, reasoning that payment delays of more than two years have adversely affected them financially.
According to Bougard, the idea to meet with the Minister of Finance and Public Enterprises, was to assist them in getting tax exemption on the severance package that will be paid, but the Minister has not been forthcoming.
“They keep on telling us that it is our money but they cannot pay out our money so who is benefiting from delaying to pay our money. All they talk about is processes and regulations they have to follow but surely there should be a reasonable timing when to finalise issues,” he said.
Furthermore, he explained that a lot of people lost their houses some even had to sell their houses to make ends meet. He said he is also on the verge of selling his house because of the severance packages that are still outstanding and money that is owed to him and they cannot find jobs because the posts that are sent out have age restrictions.
He lamented the fact that during their meeting with the parliamentary standing committee the former employees were just given two hours while Namibian Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) and Namibia Students Assistance Fund (NSFAF), were given the whole day to state their case. He said ex Air Namibia workers could not raise all their issues nor give proper information because they had to rush through the information for the issues to be addressed.
Meanwhile, the chairperson of the committee, Nono Katjingisua sympathised with the former employees and explained that delays in dealing with the matter were not intentional and petitions received by parliament go through a process before it is submitted to the relevant committee for further action.
