OVER 300 GAMTEL/GAMCEL CONTRACT WORKERS DEMAND COMPENSATION

A total of 350 contract workers of the national telecoms company Gamtel/Gamcel have claimed that they are yet to receive their compensation benefits given to other staff under the restructuring and privatisation scheme of the company.

Last year, the minister of digital economy Lamin Jabbi informed lawmakers that the World Bank has provided funds amounting to US$4.6 million for the compensation of over 600 staff affected by the privatisation.

However, a number of affected staff who spoke to The Standard complained of long delays and mounting confusion over the payment of their social security benefits adding also that they have been excluded from the compensation package.

They further blame ‘management’s failure to settle their contribution arrears at the Social Security and Housing Finance Corporation.’

“These arrears amounted to over D100 million over the period since 2022 when they were last paid and this attracted penalties for both the Pensions Scheme and the National Provident Fund. But the Gamtel management has signed an agreement with the SSHFC and made a payment of D15 million borrowed from Ecobank, and as we speak, the affected staff under Gamtel have started receiving their benefits. But for Gamcel, nothing is done,” one of the Gamcel staff leaders told The Standard.

He continued:”Everytime we went to Social Security, they would tell us that the D15 million paid to them only factored staff of Gamtel and not Gamcel. This is really bringing problems for us. Some have left since October 2025 but they are not being paid their social security benefits up to date”.

According to the affected staff, they have been told they are not eligible for this payment package because they were employed under contract basis.

“Some of us have been working at Gamcel and Gamtel for 10 or 15 years and therefore we are baffled by the management’s claim that we are not factored in the Social Plan because we are not permanent employees. But this is not true. We have made our findings from the Department of Labour and we were informed that we are eligible for compensation. According to our information, anybody who worked after six months is a permanent staff member,” the staff leader stated.

He said the affected staff were later informed that a memo was sent to the Ministry of Finance for them to be paid but “since then nothing is being done.”

He also expressed concern over the alleged disappearance of D13 million in staff contributions which were deducted from staff salaries but not paid into the Credit Union account.

Management explains
Contacted about these complaints Fatou Fatty, the general manager of Gamcel admitted that the payment of social security benefits has been “an issue” but management has negotiated with Social Security and the Corporation has “started paying” employees retrenched under Gamtel with a significant number already being paid. She said a similar arrangement has also been concluded for affected Gamcel employees, who are expected to begin receiving their benefits.

She explained that the payment faces delay because Gamcel has arrears with Social Security and due to the large number of staff affected, the institution does not have enough funds to settle the amount to cover all the staff affected.

“So we made an arrangement with Social Security where they asked us to do a down payment so that they can start paying the staff and that payment has started,” Fatty stated.                      

Fate of contract staff
On the fate of the 350 staff that alleged exclusion from government’s Social Plan package for not being permanent staff, the general manager said: “With respect to those under contract, it is correct that they were not included in the Social Plan. However, Gamtel and Gamcel took the decision to retain these employees pending the processing of their severance payments. Consequently, they remain active employees of the institutions receiving their monthly salaries because they are not retrenched.”. 

Asked how long will they remain on their jobs at Gamcel Fatty said: “As long as we don’t have funds to make their severance payments, they will continue to be with us. This retrenchment money was given to the government by the World Bank, so they only focus on the permanent staff, not those that are on contract. But we don’t have a budget to pay these large numbers to let them go, so we decided to keep them and pay them salaries until we get money to pay them off,” she said.

Source: The Standard