Backlash against Absa’s job cuts

Trade union Solidarity has launched a campaign to stop Absa Bank’s retrenchment programme, claiming some employees were escorted out of the building like “criminals”.

The campaign’s slogan is called Today, Tomorrow, Goodbye”, Dirk Hermann, deputy general secretary of Solidarity, said on Tuesday.

It comes after several Absa employees and consultants and its actuaries’ unit received letters regarding Absa’s restructuring programme last week.

Several employees’ services will be terminated on Saturday, others by May 13. The number of employees and posts affected is not yet known.

“According to our information, Absa was instructed by Barclays to cut personnel costs by 10 percent. It is clear to us that Barclays’ grip on Absa is getting tighter. Our focus will therefore shift to Barclays. We don’t approve of a situation where the employees of a profitable South African bank subsidise a bank in Britain,” said Hermann.

Absa denies mass retrenchments.

Solidarity aims to drum up public support for the campaign through Facebook and Twitter – #StopAbsa was trending on Twitter on Tuesday.

A YouTube video will be released later in the week relating how employees “were forced to pack up their belongings and were escorted out of the building like criminals in front of their colleagues”. A number of their co-workers started crying when they saw them escorted out.

“This style of laying people off is unfamiliar in SA, and we cannot allow a foreign company to establish a strange and unacceptable culture in SA,” added Hermann.

Absa said on Tuesday: “Since 2009 Absa has consistently indicated that the bank was endeavouring to improve efficiencies and effectiveness, while reducing duplication.

“Where the reorganisation of particular business units is necessary, we aim to minimise the impact on our people through effective processes to find suitable placement for these employees. In exceptional cases, this may not be possible.

“Still, it must be noted that the process under way does not amount to mass retrenchments, as affected employees are given the opportunity to apply for positions across the group.”

Hermann said part of the campaign would include “thousands of protest messages” to Marcus Agius, the chairman of Barclays in England.

Part of the letter to Agius states: “Over the past year, Absa embarked on a restructuring programme which is now in full swing. Our information is that Barclays instructed Absa to cut its personnel expenses by 10 percent. This process is being executed in a callous and aggressive manner.

“Employees of Absa relate how they were informed that their posts were redundant; that they were immediately instructed to pack up their belongings and to hand in their laptops; and that they were escorted out like criminals. They relate how after 20, 30, and in some cases 40, years of service, they were escorted out while tears were streaming down their colleagues’ faces.”

nontando.mposo@inl.co.za

Cape Argus