AAG concerned over ballooning legal fees
THE Affirmative Action Group Matabeleland Chapter has expressed concern over the losses that the Government and quasi Government institutions were incurring in legal fees as a result of numerous cases of workers who were being sacked and reinstated by the courts.
A number of workers have been sacked mostly from parastatals only to be reinstated by the courts without loss of benefits and salaries. In most rulings, the companies are also ordered to pay the legal fees. AAG Matabeleland president Mr Reggie Shoko said the continued trend was showing that those who were heading the parastatals were not learning from previous experiences.
“The Government is then ordered to pay these people by the courts. We want Government to look into such scenarios as they lead to economic meltdown. These managers need to be responsible for their actions and we as AAG we are saying all such losses must be incurred by those managers in their personal capacity rather than burdening the Government,” he said.
He said some companies that have repeatedly lost cases against their workers include the Department of Immigration, Zimbabwe Revenue Authority, Zinwa and Zinara.
“We then tend to wonder why they don’t resort to a lesser employment disciplinary measures than going for the worst which will bite back in the future. Permanent Secretaries and managers must exercise due diligence when exercising their duties in line with the economic recovery. You will notice that an offence committed might be of trivial nature but the budget to investigate might be a thousand percent higher. In such a scenario you wonder who has robbed the Government,” he said.
There are many judgements since 2012 in which parastatals have been ordered by the courts to reinstate fired workers and also pay their legal costs.