The Industrial Relations Court (IRC) yesterday concluded hearing testimonies in a case where former Press Corporation Limited (PCL) executive management members are claiming unfair dismissal.
In the matter, the claimants are former PCL chief executive officer George Partridge, former company secretary Bernard Ndau and former group financial controller Elizabeth Mafeni.
The court has since given lawyers for both the claimants and defendants 21 days to submit their written submissions.
their claim
“After that, we will be waiting for the court to deliver its judgement,” saidlawyer Patrick Mpaka who is representing PCL.
During yesterday’s proceedings, PCL paraded its witness Stewart Malata, a non-executive director and chairperson of the PCL appointments and remuneration committee.
In cross-examination by private practice lawyer John Suzi Banda representing the applicants, Malata said the applicants were dismissed by word of mouth on December 10 2021 before they received letters of termination on January 7 2022.
He also said the PCL board cited high salaries as one of the reasons for termination of contracts despite the same board being responsible for setting the salaries of the senior executives.
Suzi Banda, in a separate interview, said that through cross-examination, the applicants buttressed their claim that the process that led to the termination of their contracts lacked transparency.
He said: “The functional review report basing on which the decision was made and the minutes from the board meeting where decisions were made, were not provided to the applicants and even to the court.
“This was confirmed by the defence witness but what the court makes of that is entirely up to the court.”
IRC deputy chairperson TamandaNyimba started hearing the case on Monday this week.
Partridge, Mafeni and Ndau were dismissed following what the PCL board called an ongoing functional review exercise aimed at introducing radical changes, including removal of some positions.
The three claim that the conglomerate unfairly and unlawfully sacked them under the guise of a functional review, and that they were never consulted during the exercise.
The court documents further show that before being fired, Mafeni and Ndau had entered into discussions with PCL to change their employment status from ‘permanent or open-ended terms contracts’ to three-year contracts before PCL abandoned the discussions.
They claim the firm later instituted a ‘functional review,’ which, according to the three, was done without justifiable reason.
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