Disgruntled security officers working for the City of Tshwane Municipality have been camping outside the Metro’s headquarters Tshwane House since Monday this week regarding various grievances, but their actions have been ignored by the City of Tshwane since then.
One of the grievances put forward by the security officers is the reinstatement of their fellow officers who have been “dismissed without a valid reason.”
These security officers are technically not employed by the City of Tshwane but are under labour brokering companies which have contracts or tenders to supply security officers to the City of Tshwane buildings and premises.
One of the disgruntled security officers pointed out that the City of Tshwane is using the said “technicality” to ignore them while in practical terms they are actually working for the City of Tshwane.
The security officers also demand unpaid salaries, bonuses and leave days, area premiums and an end to late payments.
The labour brokering security companies that the officers are complaining about include Suecoll, Ramalepe, Gubis and Triotic Security Services (which was formerly owned by the present Deputy Mayor Eugene Modise).
One of the lady security officers told Tshwane Talks that they have been ill-treated for close to three years now by the said labour brokers.
“The 2023 to 2024 bonuses, as well as the 2024 to 2025 bonuses have still not been paid to us and in 2025 none of us have been allowed to go on leave,'” she said.
Another security officer told Tshwane Talks that he was fired from Ramalepe security company arbitrarily as no procedure whatsoever was followed when terminating his contract.
“I was not given any reasons for the termination of my contract and I was only told that if my name is not on the roster of those scheduled to work then I must know that my contract has been terminated, and this has been the case since 28 February this year and that was the last time I ever worked for the City of Tshwane,” he lamented.
“I don’t have any offence that I have committed; I have not been late for work or absent,” he said.
“Our salaries at Ramalepe always flactuate and sometimes we are subjected to taxation by SARS yet we don’t earn up to R200 000 per annum,”he said.
He said he doesn’t want to work for labour brokers Ramalepe anymore because the company is abusive and that all that he wants is to be paid what is due to him as the company’s former employee.
It has been revealed that the labour brokers didn’t contribute any money to the Provident Fund yet they used to deduct money from the officers’ salaries under the guise of sending it to the Provident Fund.
Yet another disgruntled security officer said his contract and that of his fellow workers has been terminated and unqualified individuals who are friends and relatives of the labour brokers have been hired in their place and that his opinion is that if the labour brokers couldn’t afford to pay them any longer, they should have consulted them instead of terminating their contracts.
SACSAAWU Secretary General Andries Diphapang Potsane said as a union they had been under the impression that the City of Tshwane was handing out labour brokering tenders to companies in order to create jobs, but this has not been the case as the termination of contracts has created unemployment chaos,” he said.
Potsane said when a workers’ contract is terminated the employer must use Section 189 of the Labour Relations Act which is retrenchment, and when an employer retrenches workers he must not hire others in their place,” said Potsane.
“What these labour brokers are doing is an act of corruption because some of the security officers who have been employed in the place of those who have been fired are not qualified and happen to be friends and families of the labour brokers,” he said.
He pointed out that the disgruntled workers will continue camping outside Tshwane House until the labour brokers are summoned by the City of Tshwane to come and pay the security officers what is due to them and give jobs to those who want their jobs back.
He insisted that Teotric Security Services is still owned by Deputy Mayor Modise.
This despite Modise claiming that he has resigned from the company.