Telkom have recently sacked an estimated 100 contractors, the trade union Solidarity has said. The process of terminating employees’ services started in October this year already and the services of several employees were already terminated last month.

However, some of these employees who still showed up for work today were turned away. The retrenchments come after the telecommunication company gave employees here the assurance last week that the planned retrenchment of both temporary and contract employees would be postponed to 31 December.

Meanwhile, Telkom has announced in the media that the retrenched temporary and contract employees could possibly be appointed permanently. Apparently Solidarity has received no notification of these plans however.

Contractors affected by these retrenchments are employees with a direct fixed-term contract with Telkom. Employees from labour brokers are not included.

Solidarity meanwhile maintains that these retrenchments, as well as the planned retrenchment of temporary employees, are unfair because Telkom did not follow the Section 189 process required by law. The trade union therefore emphasizes that the planned retrenchment process must be started afresh.

“In terms of legislation, employers must also follow this process when employees on fixed-term contracts are retrenched before the agreement expires,” said Solidarity spokesperson Jaco Kleynhans. “The requirements of the process include, among other things, that a consultation process between trade unions and the employer take place in order to investigate alternatives to retrenchment and to agree on a severance package. However, this was not done.”

Solidarity has described Telkom’s actions regarding the retrenchment of these employees as reprehensible.