Niël Terblanché
The Office of the Labour Commissioner has embarked on a comprehensive Business Process Re-engineering (BPR) initiative aimed at enhancing its service delivery and addressing longstanding challenges in labour dispute resolution.
This was announced during a stakeholder engagement session held to solicit input and identify bottlenecks hindering efficient service delivery.
The deputy minister of labour, industrial relations and employment creation, Hafeni Ndemula, highlighted the importance of transforming labour dispute prevention and resolution mechanisms.
Ndemula acknowledged the successes so far but stated that there are still significant shortcomings that require attention.
“It would be unwise to ignore the fact that, like any other newly introduced system and process, there are, despite many successes, also many areas of deficiencies and failures. It is acknowledged that some of these inadequacies are more serious and have more far-reaching ramifications than others,” he said.
The BPR initiative aims to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of the labour dispute resolution processes, which currently involve conciliation and arbitration.
These processes have historically attracted public criticism for delays and inefficiencies.
During the engagement, the current state (AS-IS) of these processes was assessed, detailing all steps, interactions, decision points, and sources of information.
The executive director of the labour ministry, Lydia Indombo, echoed similar sentiments, acknowledging the public outcry over delays in adjudicating labour cases.
“The public complaints are especially high regarding the conciliation and arbitration process. I believe the registration of federations, associations, and trade unions is much faster. Labour cases are taking more time than expected. Some parties to disputes have given up and some have lost trust in the alternative dispute resolution mechanisms available to them in the country,” Indombo said.
The Ministry has decided to pilot the BPR at the Office of the Labour Commissioner as a response to these concerns.
The initiative seeks to provide stakeholders with a platform to collabouratively find solutions to improve the speed and efficiency of labour dispute resolution.
The engagement session is part of a broader effort by the Ministry to enhance public trust and ensure that the dispute resolution mechanisms are both effective and timely.
