MORE than 100 unemployed men who used to work for the Glencore Xstrata mine gathered outside the department of labour in Burgersfort on Monday demanding their unemployment insurance funds (UIF).
One of them told CV that they had received two months’ UIF before payments had been halted. “The department told us that they could not pay the funds because our dismissal was constructive dismissal. “We received all the other necessary funds that go along with termination. This money is our right and we demand it.”
Johannes Mokou, spokesperson for the department of labour, said the problem lay with the employer, Glencore Xstrata. “When these men applied for their UIF, they claimed that they were fired. Later we discovered that it was constructive dismissal. That is when payments were halted,” said Mokou.
Wikipedia explains constructive dismissal as: “also called constructive discharge, it occurs when employees resign because their employer’s behaviour has become so intolerable or heinous or made life so difficult that the employee has no choice but to resign. Since the resignation was not truly voluntary, it is in effect a termination”.
Mokou said the matter would have to be cleared up with help of the CCMA.
“The CCMA must now certify this as a dismissal. The department is working with the mine to fix the error. The men were told that the matter would be resolved before April 25.”
The labourers were part of the 1 000 workers sacked by the company last year. About 200 Helena Mine workers were dismissed last May after workers at three of Xstrata’s chrome mines in the province embarked on an illegal strike. Their dismissal came after three ultimatums had been sent to them, the first two to inform labourers that they should return to work. The third was a notification of their dismissal.
The miners, most of which belong to the Association of Mineworkers and Construction Union (Amcu), stopped work in solidarity with an individual who said he was assaulted by a shift supervisor.
The workers were given an opportunity to appeal their termination.
