Gov�t, BOFEPUSU Fail To Meet Over Compliance Issue
Goitsemodimo Kaelo | Monday April 24, 2017 15:39
On Thursday, BOFEPUSU wrote a letter to the Council chairperson Tsetsele Fantan to convene a special meeting on Friday to discuss the issue of compliance to the PSBC.
This followed a fall-out between the employer and trade Union party at the meeting held on Tuesday, which was convened specifically for the 2016/17 salary negotiations.
At that meeting, Government (employer) reportedly turned down three percent acceptance by the Union party (BOFEPUSU) and refused to proceed with the meeting demanding that a new agenda item dealing with “compliance to the PSBC constitution to be included immediately after the welcome remarks”.
The employer party argued that it is procedural for a new item to be added on the agenda during PSBC meetings for salary negotiations because it would enable the Council to confirm whether the meeting is duly constituted while the union party believed that a new agenda could not be included in that meeting as the special meeting convened specifically for salary negotiations.
Consequently, the employer party declined to respond to any substantive issues proposed prior to adoption of the agenda, leading to a deadlock.
However, in a move to have the 2016/17 salary negotiations completed, BOFEPUSU requested a special meeting on (Friday) to deal specifically with the issue of “compliance to the PSBC constitution”.
“We wrote to the chairperson to convene a special meeting on Friday to deal with the issue of compliance, so that the salary negotiations could continue.
If they don’t want the meeting then we will have to make an urgent application seeking an order to force them return to the negotiation table,” said BOFEPUSU deputy secretary general, Ketlhalefile Motshegwa.
However, on Friday BOFEPUSU announced that the employer party has turned down the proposal to convene such meeting, stating that their representatives at the Council, Permanent Secretaries and Directors are busy.
BOFEPUSU has said that the actions by Government show that it does not want the Council to function because it has eight representatives at the Council who attend the meeting alternatively.
Endless efforts to talk to the employer representative were not successful at press time.
Last week, Francistown High Court ruled in favour of BOFEPUSU in a case in which Botswana Public Employees Union (BOPEU) had taken the federation to Court on urgency seeking that BOFEPUSU, an admitted party to the PSBC, be ordered to submit its audited membership figures for the period ended December 31, 2016, and in terms of Article 8.1 of the constitution of the PSBC.
BOPEU also wanted BOFEPUSU to be declared to have violated Article 8.1 of the constitution of the PSBC, that BOFEPUSU be immediately ordered to pay its outstanding financial contributions of P1,065.30 and that its PSBC membership be suspended.
BOPEU also wanted the chairperson of the PSBC to be interdicted from convening PSBC meetings pending compliance with the reliefs sought by the applicant.