KUJ has started piecing together evidence and other documents to back up the case it plans to file against Standard Group for laying off its members. A circular from the Kenya Union Journalists Secretary General Eric Oduor to its members affected by the ongoing redundancy at Standard seen by BusinessToday warns of “the mother of all battles to end annual rituals in newsrooms.”
Mr Oduor says in the letter that KUJ officials met their lawyer, who advised that there are loopholes in Standard’s restructuring exercise that declared a number of journalists redundant which make a strong case for the laid off journalists. KUJ is collecting copies of the redundancy letters from those sacked for the lawyer to comb through for any smoking gun.
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“She therefore wants copies of those letters since they were tailored made to satisfy SGL’s (Standard Group Ltd) interest,” says Mr Oduor. “Please those who are in town drop a copy at our office or scan and send me a copy ASAP.”
The lawyer needs these documents by tomorrow Tuesday afternoon to prepare a petition. “Please let us cooperate to get justice,” he adds.
It has also emerged that Standard’s human resources office has been recalling some redundancy letters and issuing fresh ones in what appears to be an attempt to reduce its exposure in case of litigation.
A HR expert based in Nairobi says those declared redundant have a strong case against the country’s oldest media house. He argues that Standard Group is not making losses and thus cannot purport to declare staff redundant. “Secondly, the positions the journalists who have been fired still exist and saying they are redundant is a contradiction,” he says.
In fact, the case against Standard will be helped largely by the fact that the company is already hiring new people to take up those “redundant” positions. “They have destroyed careers of young journalists. It does not sound well to be declared redundant at 26,” said the HR manager, who works for an NGO.
An editor at Standard said the company is looking to hire cheaper journalists in an effort to manage its wage bill. “As we speak, they are hiring and recalling correspondents from bureaus to come to Nairobi,” said the editor.
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