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Labour Court orders reinstatement of two SARS executives

Details

SARSTimesLive reports that the Labour Court has ordered the reinstatement, with backpay, of two SA Revenue Service (SARS) executives dismissed in 2017 after questioning the “restructuring” process.

The court said their sin was to question the integrity of the restructuring by then commissioner Tom Moyane, with management consulting firm Bain & Company as service provider. One of the women blew the whistle on the alleged unlawful appointment of Bain at SARS. The positions of Hope Mashilo and Tshebeletso Seremane were downgraded after the restructuring in August 2015 and the two women were ordered to accept positions which were not in the approved “new structure” introduced by Bain. The employees repeatedly asked for information about the positions being “dictated” to them, which entailed them doing no meaningful work, but no information was forthcoming. The employees refused to accept the positions and this prompted Moyane to inform them that they must either accept the positions or face dismissal. The employees were dismissed due to “operational requirements” in terms of a section in the Labour Relations Act. They then challenged their dismissals and sought reinstatement. In addition, Mashilo sought an order to declare her dismissal automatically unfair due to a protected disclosure she made in terms of the Protected Disclosures Act. In a judgment handed down on Monday, acting judge of the Labour Court Smanga Sethene said SARS had failed to justify the dismissal of Mashilo and Seremane for operational reasons.

  • Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Ernest Mabuza at TimesLive
  • Read too, Court victory for SARS whistleblower, at GroundUp


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