VICTORY FOR UNIONS IN COLA CASE

MBABANE – It is victory for PSAs as the Industrial Court has dismissed government’s application to have  the cost-of-living-adjustment (CoLA) case postponed to March next year.

Industrial Court Judge President Sifiso Nsibande yesterday found that the application for postponement was tantamount to interdicting industrial action by the public sector associations (PSAs).

The PSAs are the National Public Service and Allied Workers Union (NAPSAWU), Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT), the Swaziland Democratic Nurses Union (SWADNU) and Swaziland National Association of Government Accounting Personnel (SNAGAP).

Reason

“The primary reason for the application is not to enable the applicant (government) to prepare and be ready to present its case at a later stage but to delay the final outcome of the main application on the basis that whatever that outcome is, there will either be no point to the strike action, on account of government’s inability to provide CoLA or there will be no further attempts to press for the CoLA through strike action again,” said Judge Nsibande.

The court said it appeared to it that the application for postponement was an attempt to interdict the contemplated strike action and any future strike actions that involved the parties and the 2017/2018 CoLA issue, without actually making a direct application in that regard. “In our view, it is not in the interest of justice to grant the postponement.

The Industrial Relations Act 2000  gives employees the right to organise, in terms of Part IV of the Act,” said the judge president, sitting with members of the bench, Mathokoza Mthethwa and Musa Dlamini. He further pointed out that the Industrial Relations Act 2000, also allowed a party to engage in a lawful strike if a dispute had been certified as unresolved dispute under Section 81(5). 

The court found that the provisions of Section 86 of the Act had been complied with.
Judge Nsibande also highlighted that the right to take part in union activity was enshrined in Chapter III of the Constitution of the Kingdom of Eswatini. He said: “It is the duty of this court to protect the right within the confines of the law.”

The court found that the PSAs were in possession of a certificate of unresolved dispute and they had complied with the provisions of Section 86 of the Industrial Relations Act.

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