Workers rejoice over SABC court failure

The SABC's unsuccessful court challenge to declare the appointments of some of its workers invalid has been hailed as a victory for workers across parastatals. These were the sentiments of media workers union Bemawu after the public broadcaster's application to set aside the appointments of 28 workers was dismissed by the labour court on Thursday.

A chuffed Bemawu presdient Hannes du Buisson, whose union had represented four of the 28 workers who were affected by the court action, said had the SABC's application been successful, it would have meant all parastatals could review and set aside employees' contracts. "This court victory guarantees job security of all workers," he said.

Du Buisson, howerver, said it was sad that the court didn't issue a cost order against the SABC as some workers had to dig deep into their coffers to mount a legal defence. "We are extremely happy about the outcome as employees were dragged to the court. But we are disppointed we didn't get a cost order against the SABC. We hear some of the employees who were not unionised had to each pay around R150,000 to have their lawyers to defend the matter. I think those employees should go to SABC's labour relation division and claim those money because they are not the ones who took the SABC to court," he said.

When approached for comment, the state-owned entity responded: “The SABC is studying the judgment and its rationale and we will communicate our position on the way forward."