Court stops State House transfers
The Industrial Relations Court (IRC) in Blantyre has stopped State residences from transferring about 99 employees to various government ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs).
The court made the order following an application by McJoe Kuyenda and 98 other staff working in State residences who challenged State Residences management’s decision to transfer them and subsequently evict them from their institutional houses.
Delivering the ruling on October 11 2022, IRC chairperson Austin Msowoya also stopped the defendant from forcefully evicting the 99 employees from their institutional houses until the matter is completed or another order is issued against the decision.
Reads the ruling in part: “Applicants are hereby ordered and directed to file a motion inter-parties for the continuation of this order of urgent interim relief within 14 days from the date of this order.
“Should applicants fail for any reason whatsoever from complying with the order, the orders granted above shall stand discharged and vacated without a further order of this court.”
Appearing before High Court of Malawi Judge Chimbizgani Kacheche on July 19 2022 on the same matter, the concerned staff, through their lawyer Luciano Meckeus, argued that State Residences’ decision to transfer them to other MDAs was not fair because they were not consulted on the matter.
The applicants further argued that they applied for State Residences jobs and not MDAs, saying if there are transfers, they are supposed to be within State Residences establishment.
But in his submission, Attorney General Thabo Chakaka Nyirenda, who is the defendant in the matter, raised a number of objections to the application for injunction, including that the applicants are civil servants who cannot, therefore, choose when and where to be transferred to.
The applicants’ move followed a memo from the Office the President and Cabinet, issued on May 22 2022, on the transfer of about 136 employees from State Residences to other MDAs.
The employees, some of whom joined State Residences in 1992 during the Kamuzu Banda regime, include security officers, gardeners and housekeepers.
