H-Metro
Mathew Masinge
THE Merchant Bank of Central Africa (MBCA)’s retrenchment dispute of 2011 is far from over.
Nine affected workers have dragged the bank to the High Court claiming it failed to calculate their packages by leaving out their allowances.
The bank, which was a member of Nedbank, laid off 52 workers in a contested move which saw a number of managers, and non-managers, losing their jobs.
The matter was referred to the Supreme Court and later remitted to the Labour Court where the nine argued that the miscalculation amounted to unfair labour practice.
The Labour Court referred the matter to an independent arbitrator, who awarded the affected former employees US$54 206 each.
However, the bank now claims the award was affected by SI 33/2019, which converted all US dollar balances to the Zimbabwe dollar on a 1:1 rate.
It claims the balances must be paid in local currency.
“The claimants were managerial employees of MBCA until a retrenchment process was initiateåd. The parties failed to agree on the need and terms of retrenchment resulting in the matter being referred to the Retrenchment Board.
“The Claimants were chosen by the other retrenches to lead the negotiation process, and an issue then arose regarding the applicable salary in calculating the packages,” reads part of the documents filed in court.
Some of the workers demanded US$10 000 in exit packages which the company turned down.
Parties have reached a stalemate and the retrenched workers, led by Michael Manzini, want the bank to pay interest.
