Union questions legality of R381m Ters payment to Post Office

Support to employees 'is a much-needed lifeline'

- By Mpho Sibanyoni

A union representing workers of the cash-strapped Post Office has slammed government's decision to pay their salaries through the department of labour's Temporary Employer/Employee Relief Scheme (Ters) for six months.

This comes after the chairperson of the portfolio committee on communications and digital technologies, Khusela Sangoni Diko, said the approval of six months of income support to the Post Office workers was “a much-needed lifeline that the state is both morally and duty-bound to extend”.

Tutu Mokoena, the secretary general of Integrated Communications Workers Union said it was unlawful for the Department of Labour and Employment, through its entity the Unemployment Insurance Fund, to extend Ters to the Post Office under current circumstances.