Worker’s unions Solidarity & CWU irked with Telkom’s retrenchment plans

South African state-owned telecoms company Telkom has come under heavy criticism following an announcement to shelve its staff.

Telkom announced that it will retrench about 15% of its staff but it seems the move has irked the unions.

Communication Workers Union (CWU) and Solidarity have criticised Telkom over its planned job cuts as the company announced the decision on Tuesday.

The telephone group revealed its intention to enter into a formal consultation process with relevant stakeholders in terms of Section 189 of the Labour Relations Act (S189A process) regarding the restructuring of certain operations.

As reported by BusinessTech Africa, Telkom also said the S189A process will impact all business units and subsidiaries and is intended to ensure the sustainability of the group, says Telkom.

“Given that at least three related business units are affected (Telkom, Openserve, and BCX), there is an added layer of complexity in this regard,” Solidarity’s Morné Malan told ITWeb.

“It is of vital importance to us not only that workers are not unduly disadvantaged, but also that our members, who will continue their employment after the process, can be reassured their company will be stable and sustainable after the process has been finalised.

“We will continue to actively engage and consult with Telkom and the other entities in accordance with the Labour Relations Act to ensure none of our members’ rights are infringed upon, especially given the precarious situation in which workers find themselves where unemployment is staggeringly high, inflation has climbed drastically and the overall economy has stagnated.”

At the same time, CWU through secretary-general Aubrey Tshabalala lambasted the company’s decision, saying the excuse is just lame.

“This is just a lousy excuse for creating an artificial profit for executive and board members to pocket lucrative bonuses every two years,” he told the same publication.

“If you go to 2016, 2018, and 2020 retrenchments processes, the rationale is the same, with a few senseless additions, such as the release of the spectrum and the COVID-19 lockdown.

“When Maseko took over, Telkom had a net debt of R545 million, compared to when he left in 2022, leaving Telkom with R16 billion debt. Now the new CEO [Serame] Taukobong appears to be following in his footsteps and this will have a disastrous end result, which may lead to a complete closure of Telkom.”

As things stand, Telkom employs about 11 000 employees, meaning up to 1 600 employees will be shown the door.