Africa-Press – Botswana. The Ministry of Labour and Home Affairs continues to monitor adherence to labour laws through laid out and requested workplace labour inspections, mediation and arbitration of disputes to ensure fair labour practices in workplaces including the mining industry or sector.
Minister of Labour and Home Affairs, Major General Pius Mokgware explained this in Parliament when responding to a question from Maun East MP, Mr Goretetse Kekgonegile on Friday.
The Employment Act, Cap 47:01, Section 95 (12) empowers the Commissioner of Labour to grant an employer permission to engage an employee to work overtime for more than 14 hours.
In any case where the commissioner believed that circumstances warranted the employees to be engaged continuously, Minister Mokgware said work was done in a shift pattern where the mining house was engaged in continuous operation that required work to be done continuously for 24 hours a day.
The company in consultation with the workers, he said, would then configure a shift pattern, which would enable the work to be carried out continuously.
“This provision, therefore, exempts the employer from the provisions of Section 95 (7) of the Act, which limits the hours of overtime to be worked in any one week not to exceed 14 hours.
He said from January 2020 to date, his ministry had issued 45 exemption certificates to mining houses and sub-contracted companies, whose durations ranged from one month to 12 years depending on the operation undertaken.
“It should be noted that before issuance of these exemption certificates, both the employer and the employees or the employees’ representatives, or union branch committees, should have adequately consulted, discussed and agreed on remuneration, safety and health consequences of working excessive hours and a fatigue management plan in place,” he said.
The 12 years exemption issued on April 13, 2022, Maj. Gen. Mokgware said, was to be reviewed after years from its inception, explaining that for all the applications for exemption certificates, workers through their union branch committees or workers representatives, were engaged before the exemption certificates were issued. Additionally, in companies that were not recognised, or unionised, he said, workers were requested to nominate representatives who negotiated on their behalf.
He said the Commissioner of Labour had to be reassured that employers had extensively consulted with workers before making an application for exemption of hours. The application to the commissioner, he said must be accompanied by; signed minutes, attendance register and agenda to prove that there were extensive consultations of the new work arrangement conducted, fatigue management plan detailing how the parts would manage fatigue from excessive hours worked and shift roasters on the new work arrangement.
Before the issuance of the certificate Minister Mokgware said the Commissioner of Labour, the workers, through their nominated representatives or trade union branch committees, met virtually or in person to discuss the application before the Commissioner of Labour.
However, where there was evidence of lack of adequate consultation, the minister said the parties were returned to first adequately consult and agree on all issues, before bringing the application to the Commissioner of Labour for assessment.
In addition, Maj. Gen. Mokgware explained that Section 95 (5) of the Employment Act also required overtime worked by employees to be paid on a straight shift. However, he said other mines paid overtime in shift work pursuant to the provisions of Section 97 (2) of the Employment Act, Cap 47:01.
The section, he said empowered the employer to pay the average number of hours worked in any period of three weeks and pay anything in access of 48 hours of overtime for the period worked.
“My ministry is aware of some companies who appoint employees on short term contracts not aligned to the duration of the company’s duration of work. Currently the Employment Act provides contract of employment for a specified period of time, which employers rely on to give employees short term contracts of employment,” said the minister.
To address the matter, he said a proposal had been made in the review of the labour laws to address the concern.
Mr Kekgonegile had asked the minister to brief Parliament on efforts made to monitor adherence to labour legislation and ensuring fair labour practices in mines.
Mr Kekgonegile wanted the minister to respond with particular reference to; addressing the Exceptional Certificates permits granting 12 hours of work in mines given the negative social and health impact of such long hours and a health-hazardous work environment.
The legislator also wanted to know how many, and which mines, had Exceptional Certificates and the duration of each certificate, the mines where unions engaged upon applications and granting of Exceptional Certificate, why were unions not involved in other mines and how did the ministry intend to avoid such occurrences.
Furthermore, Mr Kekgonegile had asked the minister to state why the ministry permitted mines to pay average overtimes and not full paid overtimes.
Source: DAILYNEWS
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