BOFEPUSU loses against Khama, Morupisi
Isaiah Morewagae | Friday May 2, 2014 12:37
The union had sought to have their issues heard urgently, and further asked the court to put a gag on Khama and Morupisi from making any unilateral announcements on bargaining council matters.
However, Lobatse High Court Judge Michael Leburu dismissed the unions’ case before he even dealt with its merits. Unions were further ordered to pay government costs of the litigation.
Leburu further said that BOFEPUSU failed to convince the court that their matter warranted to be heard urgently.
In his ruling Leburu said the factors raised by BOFEPUSU did not satisfy the requirements of urgency. He dismissed BOFEPUSU’s fear that unilateral statements made by Khama and Morupisi will be repeated without the backing of a court interdict as highly speculative.
Leburu also found that both parties were bound to negotiating in good faith as part of a collective bargaining process.
In this case, Leburu said, neither Khama nor Morupisi took the unions’ rights away from them hence they have not suffered any irreparable prejudice to bargain.
“The negotiation process is still to commence as such it becomes difficult to fathom how the applicants will suffer prejudice if the orders sought are not granted on urgency,” Leburu said.
He further failed to recognise any prejudice that may be suffered by BOFEPUSU if the interim four percent is not stopped.
“In other words how will they derail them from obtaining redress or bargaining for a higher increase in due course when negotiations have not even started,” Leburu said.
He emphasised that the salary negotiations have not commenced and therefore cannot be cancelled or stopped.
“The parties to the bargaining council still have ample time to negotiate,” Leburu said.
He added that applicants will not have substantial redress from such bargaining process and would be tantamount to second-guessing the outcome of the negotiations.
Leburu added that avenues for obtaining such substantial redress are still extant and available from the Public Service Bargaining Council.
He averred that there is even a possibility of mediation, which further opens up another avenue for getting redress with regard to what salary should be awarded.