The Botswana Transport and General Workers Union (BTGWU) has hauled the Botswana Railways before the Gaborone Industrial Court for breach of its contractual obligations to its employees. Top of the list is payment of salaries which BR has traditionally done on the 24th of each month or earlier on a Friday if the official payday falls on a weekend day. That is no longer the case and the late payments come at considerable (and literal) cost to the BR employees.
In much the same way that a sister organisation in the Ministry of Transport and Public Works (Department of Roads) has taken to putting up road signs that warn motorists of pot holes than actually fix those potholes, BR has asked creditors to allow its employees a few more days to pay stop orders than to actually pay on time.
The issue of late payments came up during a special joint negotiating committee (JNCC) meeting that was held on July 12, 2022. Minutes of the meeting, which have been filed as annexures to BR’s application, say that a member of BTGWU’s executive, Melton Lufu, complained that “stop orders are not met on time from banks as salaries report late.” In response, BR’s Acting Chief Executive Officer, Chelesile Malele said that “they sent a communique to the banks that they should move up the stop orders to the last day of the month on deduction of loans etc and the banks agreed to this.”
However, minutes of another JNCC meeting that was held on February 1, 2023 show that this issue was never resolved. At that meeting BR’s General Counsel and Board Secretary, Kgotso Ollyn, “apologised for the late payment of the January salaries that were paid in February and that the communication of the late payments came late.” Ollyn, who chaired the meeting, further stated that “going forward, the situation is still going to persist, where salaries are paid late contrary to the stipulated dates on the payment of salaries calendar but he assured the Union that they will communicate that in advance.”
The minutes quote BTGWU’s president, Gaebepe Molaodi, as saying that the arrangement that BR has made with banks was not working because they were still penalising late payments. “She implored management to write to the banks about this issue and advise them not to charge penalties for late payment of loans,” the minutes say of Molaodi.
BR’s Acting Director of Finance, Amon Sefawe, would later confirm that the organisation has written to banks “to at least give Botswana Railways employees five days allowance after payday to pay their loans.”
At least according to Molaodi, the late payment could also be compromising the health of staff members. At that same meeting, she pointed out that “medical aid providers have begun to not assist employees” and that the Union has written to management to complain about this issue.
“It looks like it is not given priority it deserves as the last payment was made in April 2022. The latter would mean that at the time of the meeting, BR had not been paying medical aid providers for 10 months. However, such claim was refuted by BR’s Acting Director of Finance, Amon Sefawe, who told the meeting that there has no problem with paying medical aid providers.
Likewise, BR has not been remitting pension premiums to pension funds and Molaodi raised concern that “some employees have been dismissed and some retired and they have not been given their pension.” She added that “pension in 2021 was not paid which will mean that there was no interest on pensions for that year and tax is not being paid to BURS.” Conversely, Sefawe said that the last pensions’ payment was made in June 2022.
“He went on to state that AON has advised them to pay pension for those who have retired as a temporary solution.”
As the annexures show, one group of former employees appealed to both President Mokgweetsi Masisi and the Minister of Transport and Public Works, Eric Molale. In a March 8, 2023 letter to Masisi’s private office, five former employees ask the president to “assist us get payment of our pension funds” from Minet Insurance Botswana.
“We have not been paid the pension funds since we retired as far back as May 2022, the last among us having retired in January 2023. Our efforts to get our pension funds are not bearing any fruits. Minet Insurance Botswana is telling us that we cannot be paid because Botswana Railways has not paid the premiums and Botswana Railways is telling us that they do not have money to pay the premiums. We have tried to seek assistance from other relevant authorities, including the Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Transport, but the processes they suggest to be followed are just too long for our situation – our families are literally starving, and we are missing great opportunities that we could get hold of if we had the funds,” reads a letter addressed to “Private Secretary to the President.”
On the basis of these problems, BTGWU has gone to court to seek an order declaring that BR’s failure to pay its contributions to pensions constitutes breach of the employment contract and that BR itself is liable for penalties levied on its employees for failing to pay their loan instalments on time due to its own failure to pay salaries on time. Through its lawyer, Sesupo Mosweu of Labour Matters Inc., the Union seeks a mandatory interdict directing BR “to remit its contributions and those of its employees towards the pension fund and medical aid schemes and to settle all outstanding payments to the pension fund and medical aid schemes.”
