Trade union federation Cosatu says it is concerned about the SA Post Office’s plans to retrench almost 6,000 employees. This after the cash-strapped postal service announced that it would begin further consultation with labour unions about retrenchments as the financial state of the parastatal worsens.
TRADE union federation Cosatu says it is concerned about the SA Post Office (Sapo)’s plans to retrench almost 6,000 employees.
This after the cash-strapped postal service announced that it would begin further consultation with labour unions about retrenchments this week as the financial state of the parastatal worsens.
Cosatu said South Africa could not afford to have a large number of employees retrenched while the country was in a shambles due to the high unemployment rate.
Speaking to Newzroom Afrika, Cosatu spokesperson Sizwe Pamla said they had met with other affiliated unions such as the Communication Workers Union (CWU) and confirmed that they planned to meet the Sapo management.
They previously met the management on November 5 when they received the section 189 notices.
Pamla said this matter was extremely worrying. It was dealt with in the February Budget and they had tried to raise it with relevant stakeholders.
“This is unsustainable because we do need the Post Office in a well-capacitated situation and we cannot have the government that leads when it comes to the destruction of jobs,” Pamla said.
“The entire idea of having a government is that it should set the momentum and give a message to everyone out there that we create jobs and not destroy them.
“So if you destroy the Post Office then you are actually undermining the delivery of public service and sending a very toxic message to the private sector that they can follow everything the government does in destroying jobs,” he said.
Pamla said they were well aware of the financial turmoil within the Post Office.
“The government needs to do more when it comes to funding the Post Office. For example, when they separated it from the Postbank, the government never compensated the Post Office.
“This means the government is owing the Post Office,” he said.
He said the Post Office could not be trusted to carry out mandates such as distributing social grants due to its current state.
“The failure to capitalise it and give it necessary resources is currently undermining it.
“We really believe the government should move away from the approach that the Post Office needs to operate on commercial grounds, because it needs to be used as the channel to deliver much-needed services to urban and rural communities,” Pamla said.
