Disabled employee demands 24 years of backpays from SPTC
An employee of Selebi Phikwe Town Council has taken her employer to court demanding to be paid 24 years in back-payments.
Ntsemane Gaopelo, a person living with disability has been an employee of SPTC since 2000.
With just under two months left before her retirement, Gaopelo has poured her heart out to The Voice about the mistreatment she has endured at the hands of SPTC. She’s adamant she’s owed well over P5 million in backpays and leave days.
In a matter that was filed before the Lobatse High Court, details of how Gaopelo was systematically denied promotion, demoted illegally and spent 17 years in one position under the wrong salary scale emerged.
Correspondence between SPTC and her lawyers at Monthe Marumo and Co shows that since her appointment as Administration Assistant on 20th September 2000 at B5 salary scale, she was always headed for a messy showdown with the employer.
Despite living with disability, and being denied a lot of opportunities, Gaopelo executed her duties well, and was for over two decades the heartbeat of the admin office.
In the filing notice from her attorneys, they point out that four years after her appointment on 13th March 2003, their client was moved to salary scale B4 while retaining the same position of Administration Assistant.
“This came as a shock as our client ought to have been confirmed and notified on the 20th September 2001, a year after appointment,” reads part of the statement.
This according to the notice was the first of many anomalies that characterized Gaopelo’s tenure at the Phikwe council.
In 2004 she was given a letter elevating her to the position of Senior Administration Assistant under the same B4 scale.
“It remains a mystery how she was promoted and yet the salary scale remained the same,” argued her attorney.
The attorney further pointed out that even though pay structures were reviewed in 2003 with the B4 fetching P18, 864 to P22, 536, Gaopelo’s salary remained unchanged for four years.
In 2007 she was re-designated to Administrative Assistant II, still under the B4 scale.
Her lawyers argue this move was a deliberate effort by the employer to demote their client as the Position of Administration Assistant II did not exist, and was below the position she previously held.
“She instead should have been in the position of Assistant Administration Officer at the salary scale of C4/C3 which is a promotion of the Senior Administration Assistant position of which she held since 2004.”
Gaopelo’s attorneys also stated that their client was also left out of the Operations and Maintenance (O&M) exercise which was effective from the 1st September 2007 which would have moved her to the C1 scale.
“Due to the error by the Town Council, she was not legible for sponsored training when she ought to have been to allow her to hold a higher position,” her lawyers said in the filing notice.
The lawyers argued that a timeline was created that showed that their client has from the onset not been paid amounts owed to her for reasons unknown, and that throughout her career she has been promoted and yet her salary scale remained the same, or was knowingly misidentified and remained uncorrected despite her lodging complaints with the Human Resource office.
“In 17 years, I’ve been holding the same position of Senior Administration Assistant. The Administration card has eight positions which I could’ve been promoted to,” she said.
With tears welling up in her eyes, and perhaps fear of what the future holds after retirement, Gaopelo is determined to fight for her missing millions.
“I’ve served my country, and deserve to be paid my dues,” she said.
As she limped away, she adds, “Is this how we treat disabled persons in this country.”
