Man claims unfair dismissal
The young man says the company dismissed him for not recovering soon enough to return to his duties.
A YOUNG man claims he was unfairly dismissed by a retail store he had been working for following a chest injury sustained while he was on duty. Thulani Ncayiyane, who worked at Pep Stores in Malvern Park, said the company dismissed him for not recovering soon enough to return to his duties.
“We had the store’s generator on as it was during load shedding around 4pm. The manager and I kept tending to it, ensuring that it was running smoothly,” he said. An hour later, Ncayiyane, his colleague and the manager started feeling the effect of the generator’s emissions and decided to go outside for some fresh air.
“We were all starting to get dizzy. After a while standing outside, the generator stopped working and I was asked to go inside and unplug it. I did so even though I was still a bit dizzy.” While inside, the power came back on. “The manager wanted to clear us for home time and so I went to get my bag. After that, I have a blurred memory of what happened,” Ncayiyane said.
He collapsed and said a customer found him on the floor and dragged him to the door. All three employees were taken by ambulance to hospital for a medical examination and their blood pressure was checked. “They couldn’t do further tests on me because I had no money. The regional manager came to us at around 10pm and offered to take us home. I had no choice but to accept the lift home, as I had no other alternatives,” he added.
His employers arranged for him to see a doctor, who declared him fit for work. However, Ncayiyane said he could still feel that he was not in a good condition. “I consulted another doctor in my own capacity and after a few tests, I was told something different to what the first doctor said. He gave me an undisclosed time off work because of my chest pains.”
Ncayiyane said his employers were initially fine with this arrangement, but eventually started having issues with it and fired him. “Communications manager for Pep Stores, Mariki Schwiebus, dismissed Ncayiyane’s claims of unfair dismissal. “PEP paid for various doctors’ visits to assist Thulani Ncayiyane, who all gave him a clean bill of health. He was dismissed from Pep after he fraudulently changed the dates on a doctor’s sick note, as was verified by the doctor who issued it,” she said.
