Union fights salary discrimination at UB
As new leadership shoots from the hip
The newly- elected University of Botswana Academics and Senior Support Staff Union ( UBASSSU) has expressed concern over the low morale and motivation of University of Botswana workers, which they say is a result of bad conditions of service and uninspiring pay.
Following a Court of Appeal order, an Elective Congress was held and a new Executive Committee was elected where Professor Motsomi Marobela’s team won all the seats, against Dr. Kaelo Molefhe’s team.
In an interview Prof Marobela said the new leadership’s mandate is focused on fighting for the wellbeing and welfare of their Union members. He said they want to ensure that the salary discrimination and other injustices towards UB workers that have prevailed over the years are corrected so that UB staff is treated decently and humanely.
The new chairperson said as workers they want to feel a sense of belonging to “this proud institution that has been at the forefront of social and economic development of the country by generating critical human resources for all sectors of the economy.
“We demand that just like other government owned and funded tertiary institutions which are annually paid salary adjustments without fail, we too deserve to be duly paid our owed salary arrears which go as far back as 2018.”
The government and UB Management should act to correct this anomaly. Our members are saying enough is enough. We have performed our duties. Pay us, instead of mistreating us, Prof Marobela revealed.
He said as part of the campaign they had indicated that they will demand payment of salary adjustments and outstanding arrears from 2018. “We promised to fight against restructuring and retrenchments and advocate for protection of pensions,” Prof Marobela said.
They will also advocate for recognition of academic teaching staff as frontline workers in relation to the COVID- 19 pandemic.
Election Officer Ben Bolaane in his brief election report of the UBASSU elective congress stated that the elections were overseen by the five person elections committee of which he served as the Electoral Officer as per the UBASSU constitution.
The committee was assisted by nine students. He stated that the elections went on smoothly without much incident. A total of 104 ballots were cast in the election.
Court of Appeal last year ordered that UBASSSU come up with an inclusive interim Executive Committee by the warring factions. This was after UBASSSU and Chairman Dr. Molefhe withdrew the court application filed with the appeals court which was to be heard in the October 2020 session.
Dr. Molefhe has since joined Office of the President as Director of Governance. UBASSSU has since early 2019 been in court where factions - one led by union Chairperson, Dr. Molefhe and the other by chairmanship aspirant Prof Marobela – fought over the holding of an Extra- Ordinary Congress to elect new leadership of the union.
The Extra- Ordinary conference was to be held in June 2019 after two members of the union won a case against Dr. Molefhe at the High Court.