NEHAWU is angered by the retrenchments at Clinix Hospital Group

Clinix Hospital Group has a total workforce of 1200 and as per the current plan more than 100 employees will lose their jobs solely because the company has decided to embark on an opposite trajectory with an aim to maximize profits at the expense of its long serving workers. In the process the company has decided to ignore the provisions requiring it to serve notice to the union in terms of the Labour Relations Act before embarking on the process but rather they have decided to directly approach workers individually denying them the opportunity to exercise their constitutional rights to representation by their union.

The union also finds it morally and ethically improper that a Consultant registered as a Director of an International Independent Company would later accept an appointment as Acting Chief of Peoples (Managerial) position from Clinix Hospital Group, a client for which he was contracted to render an independent service in.

The Hospital Group recently built a new Clinic in Johannesburg, renovated all its hospitals with state of the art technology, it is currently in a process of opening a new hospital in Swaziland and another in Protea Soweto after it received a financial boost through the purchase of shares by the Public Investment Corporation (PIC) as an investment on behalf of the Unemployment Insurance Fund [UIF].

It is therefore obvious that the organization is not facing any real financial challenges but has opted for a mass dismissal of employees in order to maximize profits and as part of the fight back against the introduction of the National Health Insurance [NHI]. The union calls upon Clinix Hospital Group to put an end to this unnecessary planned job bloodbath which will only result in condemning its staff to a life of poverty after serving the company with excellence throughout their productive life.

We are also calling upon the Minister of Department of Labour, which holds shares on behalf of the UIF through the PIC in the Hospital Group to intervene. The union will be approaching Competitions Commission to conduct an investigation on the terms of compliance with conditions of merger agreement by both the Department of Labour through PIC and the Hospital Group in as far as it relates to guarantee of jobs made by both parties when PIC injected money into the Hospital Group.

Issued by NEHAWU Secretariat

Zola Saphetha (General Secretary) at 082 558 5968; December Mavuso (Deputy General Secretary) at 082 558 5969; Khaya Xaba (NEHAWU Media Liaison Officer) at 082 455 2500 or email: khaya@nehawu.org.za Visit NEHAWU website: www.nehawu.org.za