Cape Town — The South African Post Office have retrenched 300 workers in Limpopo, with more than 4 000 workers expected to be let go across the country.
The retrenchment is part of Section 189 implemented in the Post Office and the retrenchments will mainly affect drivers, tellers, and postmen, SABC News reported.
One of the workers, 37-year-old Walter Pheedi, is one of the 300 workers set to be retrenched and, having worked at the post-office for 13 years, said he was yet to receive a retrenchment package.
“This retrenchment has affected us…I am traumatised, my dear. You know looking at these people, they have contributed a lot to funeral parlours because some of us are going to die of (a) heart attack, many of us are going to die with stress. Many of us are going to kill ourselves because we don’t have anywhere to go,” Phaadi said.
Minister of employment and labor, Thulas Nxesi and Minister of Communications Mondli Gungubele, are in discussion about the fate of South African Post Office workers who are facing retrenchment.
Approximately 235 post office branches are closing across the country.
It is still… pic.twitter.com/kKJ2GsODbc— News Live SA (@newslivesa) April 18, 2024
Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) has called on the government to stop the retrenchments, with government has said it will intervene to reduce the number of retrenchments.
Meanwhile, the convener for Polokwane, Choshi Moraba claims the post office has not been paying their Unemployment Insurance Fund contributions since 2020, Capricorn FM reported.
Moraba said in the past four years, the post office had deducted money from employees for pension and UIF, but it ws not paying uts subsidy share to the same funds, saying it will affect the amount employees should receive.
He says the state-owned entity wants to pay retrenchment packages quarterly and not as a lump sum, arguing that it would be unjust to the workers because they would not know how to use the money.
The Post Office has given workers until the end of April as their last day in office.
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Compiled by Matthew Petersen
