By Isaac Salima
The Industrial Relations Court (IRC) sitting in Blantyre has announced that it will, in the next 21 days, deliver its ruling on how much should be paid to Agricultural Development and Marketing Corporation (Admarc) former employees who claim to have been unfairly dismissed.
About 3,282 former Admarc members of staff dragged the statutory corporation to court over unfair dismissal and unlawful, unsafe labour practices.
Thursday, the case went for assessment of a K52.3 billion compensation order after the court arrived at the amount as the value to be paid to the former employees.
IRC Deputy Chairperson Tamanda Nyimba, who is hearing the case, has since asked lawyers for both sides to file their final submissions within 21 days before a final verdict is passed.
The background to the case is that, in 2022, Admarc retrenched all its employees as part of its restructuring process.
However, the ex-workers, led by Alex Malikebu, challenged the decision in court, with the court agreeing to their applications.
The court ordered Admarc to pay the employees K35.8 billion for unfair dismissal and K16.5 billion for unsafe, unlawful and unsafe labour practices—all totalling to K52.3 billion.
However, the Admarc legal team applied for a stay of the claim, arguing that it would be difficult for them to recover the money in case they succeeded with their appeal after the compensation were paid.
The court dismissed the application.
In the forthcoming ruling, the amount that the court ordered to be paid to the ex-employees might be increased or decreased based on the assessments made.
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