Windhoek
The more than 600 fishermen and women who lost their jobs as a result of a protracted strike that was declared illegal last year were warned in advance not to down tools to avoid losing their jobs, but ignored this counsel and paid dearly for it by being unceremoniously retrenched.
President Hage Geingob said he had tried to caution the fishers against striking, so as to protect their jobs when they knocked on his door to intervene in their situation last year.
“When they came here I talked to them… against the will of many people. I said I would always talk to people. They were very polite. We talked and we said that ‘you, who are already [employed] should protect that, as there are others who do not have any work.’”
“Be careful. Those of us who are fortunate to have jobs, must try to protect them,” Geingob advised.
“No work is fair. I’ve heard very few people who celebrate their jobs and say, ‘My job is the best’. But if you have income in these difficult times, try to hold onto it.”
“You’ve seen people sleeping without any food. You have a job and at least you can afford food. You have the right to ask for an increment, but others are saying they do not have that kind of money,” he said.
The crippling seamen’s strike is said to have cost 12 fishing companies tens of millions of dollars in lost revenue over the past ten months.
Geingob was speaking during a press briefing where he also addressed the imminent teachers’ strike. He also advised the teachers against striking. “The minister [of education] said ‘no work, no pay’. Do you think teachers should be paid when they strike?” he asked.
With regard to the dismissed seamen, permanent secretary in the Ministry of Labour, Industrial Relations and Employment Creation Bro-Mathew Shinguandja recently advised them to go and beg to get back their old jobs following the breakdown of negotiations between them, the companies and government.
Shinguandja also urged the dismissed workers, who previously belonged to pension funds, to approach their former employers to either claim their benefits or have them transferred to other pension funds. Some fishing companies have expressed willingness to take back some of the fishermen, but on specific conditions and have suspended the court interdict that prohibited the workers from coming within a specific distance of company premises to allow them to approach the companies to demand their jobs back or claim their pension monies.
In a related development, the leader of the official opposition DTA, McHenry Venaani, issued an ultimatum to government at the end of October to ensure the re-employment of these fishermen within 30 days or face nationwide protest action.