54 HRE WORKERS RESIST RETIREMENT

At least 54 Harare City Council employees recently took their employer to an arbitrator after refusing to retire, despite reaching the mandatory age of 60, arguing that they still had energy to work. According to recent minutes of the Human Resources and General Purposes Committee meeting, council only won the battle against the employees after the arbitrator upheld its decision to retire the workers.

“The committee considered a confidential report (July 25, 2017, circulated with the Agenda) by the acting Chamber Secretary noting the ruling by an arbitrator upholding council’s decision to retire 54 former employees of council who had reached the normal retirement age of 60,” read the minutes.

The former employees had been aggrieved by the decision to retire them and had approached the Designated Agent for the Employment Council for the Harare Municipal Undertaking challenging their retirement. They had referred the matter further for arbitration as detailed in the report. The arbitrator ruled that council should pay the workers their pensions.

“The arbitrator had ruled that the 54 former employees had been lawfully retired,” reads the report. “The arbitrator had further ruled that council was obliged to remit pensions to the Local Authorities Pension Fund (LAPF).”
The committee did not reveal the nature of work the 54 employees were doing at council. herald

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