KIGALI - The Ministry of Public Service and Labour (Mifotra) requested UTEXRWA to reinstate employees, dismissed earlier this week.

During a heated meeting, Anna Mugabo, the Director General of Labour and Employment at the ministry, asked the manager of UTEXRWA, Trivets Deepak, to comply with her demand.

"Finding that the dismissal was in contrary to the law, he (Deepek) has to either reinstate them or give them their terminal benefits,” said Mugabo.

The 33 sacked employees and representatives of the Congress of Labour Fraternity in Rwanda (COTRAF) also attended the meeting.

"I was on leave, and when I came back, the security guards handed me a letter of dismissal without even a notification letter. This is ridiculous and unacceptable,” said Betty Batamuriza, who was an accountant at UTEXRWA before she was fired.

Mugabo reminded Deepak that there are procedures to follow when one wants to sack employees.

"According to the labour law, article 33, the dismissal ranking should be done in accordance with the performance, professional qualification, time spent in the company and social responsibilities. And this is after you have notified the employees one month before. For UTEXRWA, that was not the case,” said Mugabo.

In his defence, Deepak said that he was restructuring the company. "The dismissal was due to economic reasons and we had to reduce on the expenses,” he said.

Over 500 workers went on strike after their colleagues were fired. They also cited lack of communication with the management as well as low salaries and witholding benefits of the employees.

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