ENPF TO THE RESCUE OF LAID OFF WORKERS?

 
MANZINI – In what could come as good news to the over 8 000 workers who are on unpaid layoffs, ENPF seems to have an offer for them.

An investigation which was conducted by this publication revealed that a team from the Eswatini National Provident Fund (ENPF), which included the Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Prince Lonkhokhela, met with Cabinet on Tuesday where the options of how the fund could assist the workers in question was discussed.

In fact, a source close to the matter claimed that during the meeting, ENPF tabled a proposal on how it could provide financial relief for the laid off workers who were not paid.
He claimed that after ENPF had tabled the proposal, Cabinet discussed it until late in the evening.

It is worth noting that, according to the Minister of Labour and Social Security, Makhosi Vilakati, a total of 43 companies had applied for unpaid layoffs and 8 429 employees would be affected. A majority of the affected employees are in the textile and apparel sector as there were 8 121, while hotel and catering together with manufacturing and processing follow with 211 and 53 employees respectively.

The agricultural sector together with retail, wholesale and distributive trades had the least number of affected employees, 32 and 12 respectively.

Meet

Meanwhile, Prince Lonkhokhela, who was first called on Tuesday, asked to be contacted yesterday as they were yet to meet the Board of directors about the matter.

However, when he was called yesterday, he said they had not met with the Board. He said their meeting would be held tomorrow.
Thereafter, he said he could not comment on the matter for now because he was just an employee in the institution. He said decisions like that could only be taken by the Board and the office of Minister of Labour and Social Security.

 “We just implement the regulations as they are and if there are any variations to be done, they are usually done by the minister,” the CEO said.

On that note, he referred this publication to the minister or the principal secretary (PS) in the Ministry of Labour and Social Security for comment.
The minister said ENPF only made a presentation to Cabinet on Tuesday. He said so far, there was no Cabinet decision regarding the presentation.

“Cabinet will consult before making a decision,” the minister said.
On the other hand, the Amalgamated Trade Union of Swaziland (ATUSWA) Secretary General, Wonder Mkhonza, who represents the affected majority of the workers on unpaid layoffs, said they had received an update that there were ongoing talks between ENPF and Cabinet. He said according to the information they received, the ongoing discussions were about looking at options on how the fund could provide financial relief to the unpaid workers.

Impact

It is also worth mentioning that textile workers, who are organised under ATUSWA, articulated that the financial impact of the outbreak of COVID-19 had left textile workers dejected, hungry and hopeless.

They pleaded with the Ministry of Labour and Social Security that due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the hunger crisis among the unpaid workers, ENPF through employers, should provide support to all affected workers for the number of days that they would not be paid.

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