Africa

In March and April 2022, the Togo Teachers' Union (SET), a public teachers’ union, called a strike to demand wage and benefit increases and the hiring of new teachers. Instead of engaging in social dialogue, as was proposed by SET, the government first declared the strike illegal and arrested three SET leaders on 8 April 2022. A ministerial order on 25 April 2022 then enabled the Minister for Public Services to dismiss 86 teachers and 26 trainee teachers for their participation in the strike, and to arbitrarily freeze their bank accounts, leaving the teachers without resources since April 2022. Several dozen others were still awaiting disciplinary sanctions.

In Zimbabwe, workers at a diamond mine run by Capafare Investments, a sub-contractor of RZM Murowa Diamonds, downed tools in August 2022 to protest not having been paid for five months. The protest resulted in at least 43 employees getting fired. After a meeting on 12 August between RZM Murowa Diamonds, Capafare and workers’ representatives, the company announced that it would pay its outstanding invoices, a package totalling US$ 112,874, to ensure production continued. However, no announcement was made about the fate of the 43 workers unlawfully dismissed.

In a protracted collective dispute over wage increases and cash benefits, ArcelorMittal South Africa (AMSA) tried to thwart workers’ efforts to organise collective action. The company applied to the essential services committee (ESC) to declare the manufacturing, supply and distribution of steel as an essential service, which would qualify strikes as unprotected and would leave workers facing dismissals. Fortunately, the committee ruled otherwise, and in favour of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA).

Earlier in 2022, AMSA had won an urgent temporary interdiction which sought to ban workers who operated coke batteries or blast furnaces, and those in some sections of steel production, from joining the strike, arguing that they were part of essential services. The Labour Court dismissed the interdiction to stop the strike at AMSA, and the NUMSA resumed the strike.

By applying to the ESC, AMSA hoped to delay the strike for six days to allow the company to shut down its two blast furnaces. The ESC found that although there were safety risks in the operations of blast furnaces and coke batteries if not shut down in a controlled and well-managed manner, the risks were not sufficient to allow such infringement on workers’ rights.

On 23 May 2022, the Uganda National Teachers Union (UNATU) issued a notification to the government expressing the intention to resume industrial action if the government insisted on implementing “discriminatory salary enhancements” instead of honouring commitments made in the 2018 collective bargaining agreement. UNATU recalled that, during the signing of the collective agreement, it was also agreed that negotiations for 2020/2021 and 2022/2023 would remove disparities in scales.

The industrial action followed due process and UNATU had suspended the industrial action to allow the government to comply with the provisions of the collective agreement.

In response, the government persisted in its refusal to implement the provisions of the collective agreement and instead tried to intimidate striking teachers with summary dismissals. On 20 July, the Permanent Secretary of the Public Service issued an order to all government teachers to report to work by 24 June and called upon Chief Administrative Officers and Town Clerks to submit names of teachers on industrial action by 30 June for deletion from the payroll.

Throughout 2022, trade unions in Cameroon denounced increased attempts to break strikes and collective actions. Employers often resorted to threats against workers who took part in strikes and imposed retaliatory measures, such as initiating disciplinary measures, dismissing strikers, and applying undue wage deductions.

In Angola, striking workers were replaced by new hires at Angola-Telecom and at the Caculu Cabaça hydropower plant construction site, two publicly owned companies.

In Ghana, representatives of the Teachers and Educational Workers’ Union accused the Conference of Heads of Assisted Secondary Schools (CHASS) of attempting to intimidate teachers to force them back to work, despite an ongoing strike that began on 4 July 2022 over the cost-of-living allowance. Some teachers and non-teaching staff were being forced to remain at work by CHASS while other members were on strike. The union representatives called upon the Ghana Education Service in a press release on 8 July to order CHASS to cease its intimidation efforts.

The strike was eventually called off on 15 July, after the government agreed to pay a 15 per cent cost-of-living allowance.

The legislation in Rwanda still prohibited political office holders and officers of the security services from establishing and joining trade unions.

In Uganda, workers in the informal sector faced enormous challenges in organising, due to the instability of enterprises in this sector and the small number of workers usually employed by each enterprise, as well as the casual nature of the work. Approximately 87 per cent of the working population in Africa is engaged in the informal economy, according to the latest ILO data. Globally, 6 in 10 workers, some 2 billion people, work in the informal economy.

In Burundi, the authorities refused to register trade unions formed by workers in the informal sector. According to the latest ILO data, informal employment reached 87 per cent of the active population in Africa. Globally, nearly 2 billion workers, representing 6 in 10 workers, work in the informal economy.

Ingwebu Breweries in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, dismissed all the members of its workers’ committee, who had been elected by the workers to represent them at the company level, between July and August 2022.

The United Food and Allied Workers Union of Zimbabwe (UFAWUZ), which represents 500 of the company’s 750 employees, said that Ingwebu Breweries had refused to honour the increments agreed to in the collective bargaining agreement for the brewing and distilling sub-sector of the food and allied industries.

Furthermore, workers had not been paid on time since January. When the workers committee demanded payment of the unpaid increments and wage arrears, they were dismissed.

Things did not improve afterwards. Workers were paid a partial salary in September and were not paid at all in October. Ingwebu then tried to force workers to form a new workers’ committee. The workers rejected all their employer’s attempts to force them to do so and instead demanded that the dismissed members of the workers’ committee be reinstated. UFAWUZ demanded that Ingwebu stop victimising workers, pay all outstanding wages at once, and pay termination benefits to all employees who were unfairly dismissed.

After a wage deadlock in early 2022, and while waiting for conciliation of the dispute, the National Railways of Zimbabwe illegally fired trade union leaders who had been appointed as negotiators under the pretext of retrenchment. The dismissed workers were Kamurai Moyo, President of the Zimbabwe Amalgamated Railway Workers Union (ZARWU), Farai Dambudzo, General Secretary of Railways Artisan Union (RAU) and Sikhumbuzo Moyo, President of the RAU.

The president of the Zimbabwe Professional Nurses Union (ZPNU), Robert Chiduku, was fired on 17 August 2022 for conducting union business at work without the consent of the employer. He was based at Gweru Provincial Hospital.

At least 200 nurses were also appearing before provincial disciplinary committees at that time, for taking part in strikes and conducting union activities at their workplaces. Nurses had taken strike action in June to demand that their salaries be paid in US dollars and to push the case for better working conditions.

To stop nurses and doctors from engaging in strikes for a long period, in 2021, the government had introduced the Health Services Amendment Bill, section 5 of which restricts industrial action by health workers. Health practitioners have widely condemned the Bill, describing it as a means to prevent health workers from voicing their grievances.

On 24 November 2022, members of the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA) marched to the offices of South Deep mine which is part of Gold Fields and is based in Westonaria. Union members were protesting the management’s active obstruction of the union being recognised.

Since NUMSA started recruiting members at South Deep, they have witnessed how the management of the mine has consistently resorted to anti-union practices to prevent NUMSA from possessing organisational rights.

The protestors handed over a memorandum of 10 demands, including that the company cease the bullying and intimidation of union members, and that it process union applications efficiently and fairly.

In Nigeria, employers in the chemical industry have prevented workers from forming or joining a union. In the electricity sector, workers were threatened with dismissals if they did so.

In several states in the country, the local authorities have interfered in trade union activities and in the Rivers state, the offices of the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) were arbitrarily closed by the state government. The offices have remained sealed since then.

In the education sector in Niger, the Ministry of Education created three unions of contract workers which it used to break the teachers’ strike in January 2023.The government also arbitrarily transferred union officials to remote areas and refused to remit union dues to the National Union of Primary Teachers (SNEB) as retaliatory measures after the strike.

In Niger, anti-union dismissals were frequent. Members of the Executive Bureau of the Union of Money Transfer Agents (SYNASTRA) were threatened after forming their union and two of them were dismissed.

The general secretary of the Syndicat des Contrôleurs aériens du Niger (SYCAN) was fired without motive in June 2022. Unions suspected anti-union discrimination. His dismissal was invalidated in court later in the year.

Fousseyni Coulibaly, general secretary of the union committee of the Point G university hospital center in Bamako, Mali, has been suspended from his functions at the hospital, and therefore impeded from exercising his union mandate, since 27 April 2021, pending a transfer to another location, outside of the district of Bamako. To his colleagues, the suspension and pending transfer are an arbitrary decision by the management of the hospital aimed at weakening the trade union. They organised a strike in December 2021 to demand Coulibaly’s return but, as of May 2022, the general secretary was still suspended.

Following a series of successes in 2021, Lesotho’s United Textiles Employees (UNITE) have been confronted throughout 2022 by anti-union measures taken by employers.

Companies have tried to establish yellow unions to weaken UNITE, as seen in the case of Precious Garments. Reasoning that UNITE was “causing an inhospitable business atmosphere and capital flight”, employers have petitioned for the deregistration of UNITE. Shop stewards have been dismissed for their involvement in the labour movement, and employers have denied UNITE representation in their workplaces.

Challenging these actions, UNITE won a court battle against Precious Garments in September 2022, which ruled that UNITE could not be suspended in the workplace, and that the company and its general manager had to pay the union’s outstanding dues.

In May 2022, Zheng Yong Swaziland, a garment factory, unilaterally decided to stop deducting union dues for 1,276 workers and remitting them to the union as retaliation after workers went on strike to demand a living wage.

It took six months for the Amalgamated Trade Union of Swaziland (ATUSWA) to obtain a court order instructing Zheng Yong to stop its obstructive practices. The court ruled on 31 October that by not paying the dues to the union, the employer was resorting to unlawful ‘self-help’ which violated the Industrial Relations Act.

In Cameroon, employers often resorted to union-busting practices to block the formation of independent trade unions. Such tactics included preventing trade unions from presenting candidates during the social elections, preventing trade union members from talking to the workers, and withholding union fees.

In Burundi, dismissed union representatives were prevented from meeting their affiliates within their companies.

In 2023, workers at the Sheraton Grand Conakry in Guinea were engaged in an ongoing labour dispute over the firing of two elected trade union leaders.

After a year of actions demanding their reinstatement, on 26 October 2021, workers submitted a strike notice demanding their representatives were rehired and a renewed respect for freedom of association from management. When negotiations between workers and management faltered, union delegates announced their intent to declare a strike on 7 December 2021. Three days later, on 10 December, the management of the hotel announced to workers that, due to an alleged mould contamination, the entire hotel would close for repairs, and this would necessitate worker lay-offs.

While initially the hotel supplied no information about the terms of the lay-offs, after protests and press coverage, the management agreed to pay 30 per cent of the workers’ wages during the closure. Subsequent mobilisations pushed management to increase pay to 50 per cent during the closure, but workers continued to mobilise for full pay.

After an initial six-month period of closure, in August 2022, the Sheraton Grand Conakry's management announced its plan to terminate most workers’ contracts until the hotel reopened. In government-mandated negotiations over the planned retrenchment, the hotel owner, Palma Guinea, and the operator, Marriott, refused to provide workers’ union FHTRC-ONSLG, or the Guinean government, with documentation that outlined the alleged mould problem or the timeline for its remediation. Despite the Guinean Labour Inspector and Ministry of Labour’s proposal to preserve employment by extending the ‘temporary unemployment’ period for up to two years while the hotel was renovated, hotel management refused to engage in good faith negotiations.

The government of Zimbabwe announced a raft of economic stabilisation measures in May 2022 without consulting with partners at the Tripartite Negotiation Forum (TNF). The TNF is a social dialogue platform that brings together government, business and labour representatives to establish common ground before enacting key public policies. Yet in the case of these latest policy announcements, there had been no social dialogue. The government also refused to publish the US$150 minimum wage agreed at the TNF in September 2022.

The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) was highly critical of the measures, warning they could trigger massive job cuts and more inflation. Zimbabwe already has the second highest annual inflation in Africa, after Sudan.

In Mauritius, the transport company United Bus Service (UBS) unilaterally decided in July 2022 to cut workers’ benefits. A trade union front organised, including the Transport Workers’ Association (ATTA), the United Bus Employer’s Union (UBSEU), the Bus Industry Traffic Officers Union (BITU) and the Mauritius Labour Congress (MLC), to protest this management decision and to demand that social dialogue be restored. However, negotiations with management in the framework of collective bargaining remained fruitless.

In Mauritania, authorities and employers regularly refused to enter into collective bargaining and unduly delayed negotiations.

In Lesotho, construction workers, represented by Construction, Mining, Quarrying and Allied Workers Union (CMQ), went on strike on 15 March 2022 to demand payment according to the international standard in their industry, as opposed to the domestic one. CMQ were striking against China Geo Engineering Corporation (CGC), which had been awarded a 900 million loti (US$49 million) tender to construct a road. The union had tried to get the Directorate on Dispute Prevention and Resolution (DDPR) to force the CGC to address their concerns, but no agreement could be reached.

In response to the announcement of the industrial action, the Chinese company filed an emergency petition in the Labour Court attempting to block the workers from striking, as well as declaring the strike illegal. The Labour Court denied these claims, arguing that the case was still in the hands of the DDPR. After two days of striking, the CGC, CMQ and government officials were able to meet a temporary agreement to hold the strikes for two months to give the CGC time to address workers’ demands. However, the CGC left the bargaining table in May, which led to the workers striking once again in June.

On 4 August 2022, workers at Bank of Africa (BOA-Mali) protested with a sit-in in front of the bank’s headquarters in Bamako to demand the cancellation of a company memo that increased staff loan rates. According to Saouda Sow, secretary general of the BOA-Mali trade union committee, this note was issued without prior consultation of the staff or the union, which undermined achievements made through social dialogue.

In Zimbabwe, the 16 union leaders from the Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union, including union president Obert Masaraure, who had been illegally arrested in January 2022, were granted bail by a Magistrate’s Court. Their case was still pending in court. Meanwhile, their salaries have been docked, and the Union Secretary for Education and Research, Gerald Tavengwa, also detained, was discharged from his teaching duties. This targeting of union leaders formed part of a broader state strategy to crush the independent trade union movement and to intimidate workers.

Masaraure was still facing criminal charges of “subverting a constitutional government” following a Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions ZCTU protest action in 2019. The courts continued to dismiss his applications for discharge despite the state’s failure to bring him to trial.

In Cameroon, labour dispute cases often remained pending in courts for years, even decades, leaving workers without proper access to redress.

Three years after their unfair dismissals, Luximun Badal and Shavindra Dinoo Sunassee, respectively president of the Union of Post Office Workers Branch No. 2 and ex-president of the Airports of Mauritius Limited Employees Union, still seek their reinstatement.

Badal had been dismissed by Mauritius Post Ltd. on 18 June 2020, for allegedly refusing a unilateral transfer following disputes over the negotiation of a new collective bargaining agreement for the postal workers. The previous agreement had lapsed on 31 December 2017. Sunassee was dismissed a few days later by the Airports of Mauritius Ltd., after several attempts by management to unilaterally vary the terms of a collective bargaining agreement to which Sunassee was opposed.

On 14 December 2019, all trade unions and professional associations in Sudan were dissolved by a decree of the Sovereignty Council, which also seized all unions’ properties and assets. Since then, and especially after the military coup in October 2021, independent unions have been unable to work in the country.

In Mauritania, the authorities tended to favour pro-government trade union federations, going so far as to provide them with financial support – one of them received a staggering 62 million ouguiyas (US$ 1,7 million). Workers were often intimidated into joining yellow unions and withdrawing from independent trade union organisations. There was a general lack of protection against authorities’ and employers’ interference in trade union affairs and against anti-union discrimination.

In June 2022, yellow trade unions aligned with the government of the Central African Republic presented an appeal to the Labour Minister, asking that the 2003 Decree, designating the most representative workers’ organisations in the country, be revoked. This direct appeal to the executive, which was made in total disregard of the representativity criteria and established procedures, was a clear attempt at removing genuine representation of workers in tripartite social dialogue, including at the ILO's annual International Labour Conference. Despite this, in a decision made on the 15 July 2022, the Labour Minister acceded to their request and declared that a rotation system of representation between the various workers’ organisations would be put in place.

Since the military coup in January 2022, trade unions in Burkina Faso have been unable to operate safely or organise collective actions.

On 30 May 2022, three young trade unionists were denied entry into Zimbabwe and deported to their home countries of Tanzania and Uganda, after being harassed and threatened with arrest. They had all travelled to Zimbabwe to attend a capacity development workshop on advancing due diligence in the energy transition supply chain in Sub-Saharan Africa.

One of them, Mamisa, was detained for four hours, before being forced to board the next plane to Nairobi. The Zimbabwean officials refused to explain why she was being deported. While in custody, the immigration officers told Mamisa that they “did not want trade union activists in the country”. They threatened her and forced her to sign a form that claimed she did not have the proper documentation to enter the country.

It was only in Nairobi that she was able to get her passport back, after enduring a further four hours without food or water. She was also given a deportation form. Based on the documentation she received, Mamisa says it is still unclear why she was deported, except for her trade union activities.

On 17 September 2022, the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) was holding a meeting at its head office at Gorlon House in commemoration of human and trade union rights violations and in particular paying tribute to trade union leaders and activists who were physically attacked, arrested or killed while conducting trade union activities. Police raided ZCTU offices during this meeting and searched the offices, arresting anyone inside. The police also arrested vendors who were trading their goods near the ZCTU office. The ZCTU reported the incident to the ministry officials and also during a tripartite workshop on the Maintenance of Peace and Order Act (MOPA). However, the police officials attending this workshop responded by denying the raid and arrests.

The Secretary General of the Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (ARTUZ), Robson Chere, was arrested on 5 July 2022 and was detained at Burrowing Remand Prison. He was charged with the murder of Roy Issa, a human rights defender and a member of ARTUZ who died in 2016. At the time, a court inquest into Issa’s death had concluded that there was no foul play in his death.

Robson Chere’s arrest came barely a week after the release, on bail, of ARTUZ president, Obert Masaraure, who faced similar charges.

The ITUC wrote to the government on 8 July 2022 to remind them that only a year earlier the International Labour Organization had deplored Harare’s continued use of penal sanctions against those who voiced any opposition to the government.

Obert Masaraure, President of the Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (ARTUZ), was arrested on 14 June 2022 at Harare Police Station, where he had gone to report in line with his bail conditions. He had been charged with “treason” for participating in a teachers’ protest.

When he arrived at the police station, Masaraure was detained and later charged with the murder of Roy Issa, a human rights defender, a member of ARTUZ, and a personal friend, who died in 2016. Obert Masaraure was held at Chikurubi Maximum prison while awaiting the hearing of his new bail application.

The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) immediately protested at the arrest and demanded his immediate and unconditional release. It pointed out that at the time of Roy Issa’s death, the magistrate’s court had ruled out foul play following an inquest.

The ZCTU viewed the arrest as a clear effort by the State to silence Obert Masaraure, who has been a vocal opponent of human rights violations, as well as having worked towards better working conditions for teachers. Over a number of years, Obert Masaraure has been the victim of numerous arrests on insubstantial grounds, and in 2019 he was abducted from his home by seven masked and armed men who tortured and left him for dead.

The courts initially denied him bail but, on appeal, the High Court released Obert Masaraure on 29 June 2022. His bail was set at ZW$60,000 (US$166) with conditions, including a requirement that he surrender his passport and report at a police station once a week.

On 8 January 2023, the national delegate of the National Union of Contractual Secondary School Workers in Niger (UNECS) and his deputy were taken into custody by the gendarmerie in Dosso on the instruction of the deputy prosecutor of the regional High Court because of their trade union activities. They were released the next day at around 6pm.

On 28 August 2022, Zotiakobanjinina Fanja Marcel Sento was arrested and detained in Antanimora-Antananarivo remand centre in Madagascar following a complaint by his company, E-TOILE SA. His trial was expedited, and he was found guilty and imprisoned after a court hearing on 31 August 2022.

Zotiakobanjinina Fanja Marcel Sento had been elected on 16 June 2022 to represent the workers of the textile company E-TOILE SA. As part of his trade union activities, he had published on his Facebook account the results of four meetings held with the management of the company that took place in June and July 2022. The company filed a complaint over these posts.

In Guinea-Bissau, the residences of two leaders of the União Nacional dos Trabalhadores da Guiné- Central Sindical (UNTG-CS), general secretary Júlio António Mendonça and deputy general secretary general Yasser Turé, have been under surveillance since 2022. The two leaders have spotted unknown cars with tinted windows constantly patrolling the area around their residences and hooded men in uniform surveilling their houses. Mendonça and Turé also received messages containing threats of violence. According to UNTG-CS, this is not the first time such threats have been used against trade unionists.

On 11 January 2023, the name of Sticks Nkambule, the Secretary General of the Swaziland Transport, Communication and Allied Workers Union (SWATCAWU), was published by the police as a wanted person for alleged criminal conduct. This followed the union’s announcement of a “job stay away” on 13 and 14 December 2022, with a demand to improve working conditions and the release from prison of two members of the Eswatini Parliament. On 29 December 2022, armed police had already raided the village of Sticks Nkambule and harassed his family. As a result of such harassment, he was forced into exile.

On 2 January 2023 the President of the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT) Mbongwa Dlamini was also forced into exile following threats by security forces to harm him, after his union called for a strike on 8 August 2022. In October 2022, the government had already suspended Mbongwa Dlamini’s salary without justification and had refused a check off system for SNAT’s newly recruited members.

In Cameroon, strike actions and demonstrations were often disrupted and broken up by police forces who used beatings, arrests and threats against striking workers. The Confédération des Syndicats Autonomes du Cameroun regularly denounced this use of excessive force.

On 10 November 2022, Eswatini’s armed forces opened fire on a group of transport workers protesting the arrest and detention of five colleagues, leaving several injured. According to reports, three people were hospitalised with gunshot wounds.

In Zimbabwe, Robert Muwawa was abducted on 22 June 2022 after leading a strike at Strauss Logistics. The drivers at Strauss Logistics had embarked on industrial action over “victimisation in the transport industry,” according to the Zimbabwe Truck Drivers Union (ZTDU) which represents haulage truck drivers.

Muwawa, who was Strauss Logistics Workers’ Committee Secretary, went missing on 22 June after receiving threatening calls from the Zimbabwe Republic Police (ZRP) in Southerton.

It was reported that Muwawa was later found “and picked up by good Samaritans”. He had been brutalised and was left traumatised, but he was alive. While held captive he had been tortured and threatened with death.

Despite intimidation and harassment by the police and the army to stop the protest, textile and garment workers in Eswatini continued their strike for a living wage of at least SLZ 15 per hour or SLZ 2,983 (US$183) per month.

On 28 April 2022 a car belonging to Sibonelo Tsabedze, the Nhlangano Organiser of the Amalgamated Trade Union of Swaziland (ATUSWA), was burned by unknown people after Tsabedze had led the protest in Nhlangano earlier in the week. Another ATUSWA leader was later targeted. Wander Mkhonza, ATUSWA Secretary General had his home at Thunzini petrol-bombed on the morning of 4 May 2022.

Security forces were going as far as visiting workers’ homes and demanding that the workers go back to work or face eviction from their places of residence. Teargas was fired into some of the residences.

In Sierra Leone, several peaceful protests organised in August 2022 over the rising cost of living were brutally suppressed, killing at least 21 people. Police indiscriminately fired live bullets and tear gas into the crowd as protesters marched in the capital Freetown.

Workers’ frustrations had been amplified by rising prices for basic goods in a country where more than half the population of around 8 million live below the poverty line.

ITUC-Africa General Secretary Kwasi Adu-Amankwah expressed deep concerns about the situation and called on the government to conduct an inclusive and genuine investigation to address the root causes of the protests.

In Eswatini, Thulani Maseko, a human and trade union rights lawyer and political activist was shot dead in front of his family on 21 January 2023 at his home in Manzini by unknown gunmen.

From 2012 to 2015, Thulani Maseko defended the rights of the Trade Union Congress of Eswatini (TUCOSWA) following its de-registration by the government. Subsequently, he provided legal advice to the Eswatini trade union movement. He was also the chair of the Multi-Stakeholder Forum (MSF) that represented progressive groups working for democracy in Eswatini following the banning of political parties.