16 Feb 2023

Parliament has heard that a total of 1 170 companies have submitted notifications of intention to retrench to the Commissioner of Labour from January 2019 to January this year as required by Section 25 of the Employment Act.

Answering a parliamentary question on Wednesday, Minister of Labour and Home Affairs, Ms Annah Mokgethi also told Parliament that in the same period, 3 680 workers had lost jobs due to retrenchments.

“It must be noted that the statistics provided only reflect the redundancy information submitted to the Commissioner of Labour by companies that have completed their retrenchment process,” Ms Mokgethi added.

On the merger of parastatals, the minister said such was outside the ministry’s jurisdiction.

However, she indicated that the Commissioner of Labour received only one notification from the Ministry of Agriculture on the merger of National Food Technology

Research Centre and the Department of Agricultural Research (national veterinary services) which resulted in the establishment of the National Agricultural Institute and 13 employees were retrenched from the exercise.

Member of Parliament for Gaborone Central, Mr Tumisang Mangwegape-Healy had asked the minister to state the number of retrenchment requests issued to the commissioner as well as how many people had been retrenched since 2019.

MP Mangwegape-Healy also asked the minister to give an update on the merger of parastatals and the expected job losses. Ends