Supreme Court Termination of Employment Ruling: Storm in Tea Cup?

I have been inundated with social media posts of people raising an alarm that the regulations governing Employer/Employee relationship have been thrown into disarray by the Zimbabwe Supreme Court judgment. The Supreme Court’s 4 judges in a case of Zuva Petroleum vs Don Nyamande & Kingston Donga arrived at the decision that, “the common law position placing employees and employers on an equal footing was still operational”. As a result of this Zuva Petroleum had a right to terminate employment and pay the two employees an amount equal to 3 months’ salary. The two employees had hitherto been offered voluntary retrenchment packages which they turned down, it was at the stage of compulsory retrenchment that the employer abandoned the process and paid the employees 3 months’ salary.

There was an immediate outcry with The Herald newspaper headline saying, “Shock ruling onjob termination…judgment a threat to job security, say labour experts”. Newsday was less animated just stating “Ex-Zuva Petroleum managers lose case”. Alex Magaisa weighed in with his blog post titled, “How the Supreme Court judgmenthas left the employee exposed”. I am no labour lawyer and legal expert but retrenchment is some close to my heart after having represented employees in one grueling case armed with only my Labour Relations knowledge from IPMZ studies.

Day 2, 25 April 2015: Good Bye Anaesthetic, Hello Pain

After the surgery I felt much better, my leg was quiet and felt nothing except a numbness, must have been the wonder drugs they use during operation. I was given pain tablets, I took them even though I felt no need for them. But the nurses knew what was coming so they needed to prepare me ahead, that was proactive of them. As I woke up to a Saturday I got chance to know my neighbour who had a knee problem, he was a Jewish man who must have been in his 60s. The hospital has nurses on duty who check on you every hour, this made it hard to sleep, I am a light sleeper so any shuffling will send me wide awake. I heard the Jewish ask about me to the nurses if I was ok because I had been quiet, only my brain was racing replaying the events. So maybe he thought this fellow could be dead or immobile, the nurse reassured him that I'm alright. God bless him, Jews are a special type of people,if anyone ever needed proof that God does really exist he must watch Jews or check the most influential Jewish people & how they made it, you will understand that the blessings of Abraham still carry them to this day. 

When God Fishes You Out of Miry Clay

‎‎There is nothing like a Blogger with a lot of free time, it can happen for a few minutes because there is always a lot of thoughts rushing through the head. I happen to have a lot of free time and guess what, I'm going to blog it away. You might be wondering why I have so much free time when there is so much to do, well I was involved in an accident, a bus accident. So I might as well start blogging about that experience.

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Day One: That Drizzly Morning Ride

I took my bus at the right time about 0635 in the morning, it was a chilly and damp Friday, so I had my nice and fluffy jacket for warmth, a pair of blue jeans and those shoes that look like All Stars but cheaper ones. I never convinced myself to buy All Stars for R650, no that's a ripoff, for that amount I would rather have Adidas Superstar 2 but it's hard to find the scarlet and white I so love. So I settled for these cheap knockoffs meanwhile. The bus driver was that quiet and careful gentleman, never in a hurry and always on time. I cringe reading people judge him as reckless on news websites, they label him a careless and speeding driver, how wrong they are. I went onto the bus, exchanged greetings with him and put my bus tag for a ticket and proceeded to sit in a comfy seat towards the back, the one behind the wheel with leg room of a first class flight on an A380 plane. It's exam season so I took out my Unisa textbook and started to read. As the bus was about to leave the driver asked one lady standing outside if she was not going. She told him I'm waiting for Mr. M's bus which is coming to park just behind you. This lady I call her Madame Speaker Sir, she is a happy and chatty soul, Mr. M is the driver of bus number 85 and also member of parliament, along with other 3 youthful guys, they bring the bus alive on those trips especially back home after a hard day's work. So she hurried to Mr. M's bus and we pulled off. 

Economics: A Heaven's Perspective

Ceteris paribus or post hoc ergo propter hoc are really haunting terms for anyone starting out with Economics but for me I found this subject fascinating as it relates directly to the reason why man toil all days of his life on earth. This is a subject built on the premise of “scarcity”, that everything is not enough to allow every one of us to have all we want. One time I was pondering how my love for Economics can have a link with my faith in Christ Jesus. The two seem to be on opposite ends of in terms of proposition & might seem to never reconcile. As I peered into it, I decided Economics as we know it, has flaws that need addressing. A new economic theory perhaps that matches what the basis of our faith is. Most belief systems agree that the Supreme Being is capable of meeting anything that we as mortals desire, Animists for example believe ancestors can provide e.g. in Shona culture there is a belief that ancestors could provide food for a person in need and in the wilderness. Legend says one would go to a Hissing Tree (Muchakata) and clap in acknowledgement and right before them food will appear, same with Islam Allah is the provider. I am sure the other religions it is the same scenario. So here is my Christian perspective regarding Economics.