20 Mar 2017

Ministry of Employment, Labour Productivity and Skills Development will conduct a labour inspection at Haskins & Son Company to establish if allegations of harassment of employees by their marketing and operations manager are true.

Minister of Infrastructure and Housing Development, Mr Nonofo Molefhi has said in Parliament on behalf of the Minister of Employment, Labour Productivity and Skills Development that after the inspection, an appropriate action would be taken.

The contract of marketing and operations manager, who is an expatriate, Minister Molefhi said continued to be renewed because after advertising the position, Haskins & Sons did not find a local to fill the vacancy.

He said as a result, applications for renewal of work and residence permits were then submitted to the Regional Immigrants Selection Board which considered and approved it.

The position of plumbing technical representative, the minister said was never held by a citizen, and was advertised after the non-citizen incumbent left the company and no qualified local was found to fill it, therefore a non-citizen was employed.

Meanwhile, he noted that Section 24 and 25 of the Immigration Act, 2010 afforded a person who was aggrieved by the decision of the Regional Immigrants Selection Board an opportunity to appeal the decision of the board to the minister.

"The minister may, based on the reasons given uphold or reject such appeal, while in the current case, the minister overruled the board and awarded the work permit for the position of marketing and operations manager," he said.

Further, Mr Molefhi said since 2012, the Department of Labour and Social Security had received 10 grievances involving Haskins and Sons (PTY) Ltd.

Gaborone North MP, Mr Haskins Nkaigwa had wanted to know what was being done to address the problem of the employees of the said company who continued to suffer harassment from their marketing and operations manager and floor manager, and why contracts for the marketing and operations manager and plumbing technical continued to be renewed for non-Batswana whilst there were trained and experienced Batswana within the company. ENDS