Pretoria News reports that trade union Solidarity is planning to turn to the Gauteng High Court in Pretoria for an urgent application against the SA Post Office (Sapo) in a bid to secure workers’ rights.
Solidarity had last week sent a letter of demand to Sapo – and had given the organisation until the close of business on Monday – to provide proof that it had to date complied with all its statutory and contractual obligations towards its employees. Anton van der Bijl, head of labour law services at the union, said that since 1 April the postal service has failed to meet its statutory and contractual obligations, which included the payment of medical aid contributions, taxes and pension fund contributions on behalf of its employees. This happened even while it was continuing to deduct such contributions from salaries, he claimed. The failure had resulted in Sapo employees’ membership contributions to medical and pension funds being in arrears, which he said had serious implications and could lead to the termination of these employees’ benefits. The letter of demand indicated that Sapo was also deducting tax contributions from members as well as skills development levies, but was apparently also failing to pay these contributions over to the relevant state agencies. Van der Bijl confirmed on Monday that they had not yet heard from Sapo and said they would go ahead with drawing up court papers.
- Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Zelda Venter at Pretoria News
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