BOSETU takes DPSM to court
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Tuesday August 26, 2014 14:46
This comes after DPSM decided to redeploy the teachers to Out of School Education and Training (OSET) department.
Initially the union members were employed by Teaching Service Management (TSM) as assistant teachers or teachers, and were immediately upon their employment, seconded to the Department of Non-Formal Education. The case was filed last Friday at the Gaborone High Court.
“Making monthly deductions on the salaries paid to said members on account of the alleged salary overpayment made to such persons as a result of the Levels of Operation system.
The applicant also seeks an interim order against the respondents pending the final determination of the application that is to be instituted by the applicant against the respondents herein after the lapse of 30 days as per the mandatory notice already issued under the State Proceedings Act,” argues BOSETU.
The concerned teachers say their monthly salary scale was around P13,000 to P14,000 (D4), but has now been downgraded to government scale C1 or around P10,800 per month.
The applicants in particular complain about the fact that neither the applicant nor the individual union members were only minimally consulted or there was altogether no consultation prior to their secondment status at OSET being terminated.
They also accuse DPSM of failing to communicate deductions being made on the complainants’ monthly salaries on account of the alleged salary overpayment made to them by the respondents under the Levels of Operation system.
Their attorney Joseph Akoonyatse says there is urgency because the applicants would not be afforded substantial redress at a hearing in due course. By reason of the fact that the respondents have deliberately, without any good cause, taken a unilateral decision that is in clear violation of the union members’ procedural right of being heard before an adverse determination is taken against them.
“I aver that the members were entitled to be consulted before they were redeployed; before their monthly salaries were cut down; and before deductions were made to their monthly salaries.
I also aver that likewise, the applicant union, as a duly recognised representative of the affected union members, was also entitled to be consulted before decisions prejudicial to its members were taken.
I aver that the procedural right that is sought to be protected herein is not of the type that can be remedied after the fact. The nature of the right is such that it can only be protected by ensuring that the respondents comply with it.
If the right is not complied with, and the affected union members herein continue on the basis that they have been re-deployed (and their salaries reduced as well as deductions made therefrom) there can be no way of computing at some future date the quantum of damages that they would have suffered,” he says.
He says his clients lost opportunities that were available at their parent division, which they have been working under for all the past years; or opportunities that they would have missed due to the sudden corrosion of their economic power.
The DPSM has 30 days to respond.