BARELY two weeks after laying off over 70 of its workers, the National University of Science and Technology management has backtracked and reinstated all the employees.
In a notice by NUST Vice Chancellor Professor Mqhele Dlodlo, the university advised its former employees to report for duty immediately.
“The Vice Chancellor’s office wishes to advise that the Staff Rationalisation Exercise, which had resulted in some employees being laid off has been reversed with immediate effect. All staff members who were affected should report for duty at their work station,” read the notice.
However, in separate interviews with staff members who were laid off, they said the management reversed its “unjust decision” after discovering “they did not follow due process”.
The employees also said NUST management was forced to call them back to work after receiving “serious legal threats”.
One of the employees said: “What the management did was unprocedural. So, we went to seek advice from our lawyers they told us NUST did not follow due process. One of the simple things they failed to do was sending the notice of retrenchment to the works council.”
“NUST claimed they were implementing the government directive to rationalize staff yet they failed to send that notice to the Works Council as required by the law.
Another employee laid the blame on the University’s registrar Mr Biggy Ngwenya, accusing him of abusing his powers to “do as he pleases at NUST.”
“This was never a NUST decision, but unilateral decision by Mr Ngwenya. We don’t know why other principals are letting him do that. He is just vindictive and no one tells him what do to,” said the source.
The laid off employees said they will be guided by their lawyers on the way forward because they do not know the next steps the NUST management will take against them.
“The other thing is that most of the members already received their retrenchment packages so we don’t know whether NUST will give us salaries for this month. Worse still, we are halfway through the month,” said another employee.
It is also understood that NUST got a rebuke from government for retrenching workers at a time when the country is preparing for elections.
