... we strictly adhere to COVID-19 guideline - corporation

MBABANE - RES Corporation says it strictly adheres to the national COVID-19 guidelines in terms of transporting employees and working on site.

In the company’s answering papers, Company Secretary Lungile Msimango said RES Corporation provided sanitisers to its employees. She said the employees were transported in appropriate numbers.

Cane carrying out, according to Msimango, like other operations where people cannot work in isolation, such as planting, allows workers to keep acceptable distances from each other.

She said employees were allocated tasks and fields in a way that allowed the correct dispersion in accordance with national guidelines. Msimango also told the court that the company provided the employees with face masks.

“The respondent is at the forefront of the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic, through testing and vaccination at its two health facilities. There is no documentary proof that any of the members of the applicants contracted COVID-19 as a result of being asked to carry out the cane from the fields,” she said.

The company secretary also told the court that about 20 000 tonnes of cane remained and this, she said, presented about E15 million in lost revenue for the year if it were not delivered to the factories, which is severe under the global financial meltdown caused by COVID-19 and other challenges.

Half of the cane, according to Msimango, had already been burnt, hence it would be lost

forever, with about E8 million down the drain. She said some of the cane would still be cut as it was still standing at a cost, to allow the crop to emerge. Sugar from this cane, is already committed in sales by the Eswatini Sugar Association to international customers, said Msimango.

She submitted that if the cane were to be left on the field, the company would default on sale agreements and lose some of its customers forever.

“This is not what the court should allow. It will have devastating effects on our economy,

which mainly relies on sugar cane from the respondent,” said Msimango.

She also told the court that even when opportunities to machinise existed, RES Corporation took the approach to safeguard jobs by not exercising that option. She said they trusted that the employees were not asking the company to abandon that position by showing an unwillingness to do jobs that were critical to the survival of the business.

“If the situation persists, the respondent will be compelled to retrench,” said Msimango. The matter is pending in court.