Yesterday, GhanaCelebrities.Com broke the news that female staff outsourced from Reliance and working for telecommunication giant-Tigo’s labor rights in relations to maternity is being tramped on following a tip off from a whistle blower.
The agency had instituted a policy affecting all its Tigo workers, saying, “effective January 2016, an employee who wishes to go on maternity leave will have to apply for a break (leave without pay) and reapply for their position after the maternity break.”
The letter sent out to the workers added; “Also note that, contract duration is for six (6) months and renewable upon availability of the job and performance.”
The publication somewhat caused a social media chaos—and fetched swift response from Tigo-Ghana management, including the CEO-Roshi Motman, who promised to quickly fix the apparent illegality.
Within 24 hours, Tigo-Ghana as acted and has issued a statement to condemn the policy—as well as having instituted a quick fix.
Read Tigo Ghana’s Full Statement Below…
Re-Maternity leave policy for staff of Reliance Services working for Tigo
Regarding the story circulating in the media about a new policy directive from Tigo’s out-sourcing agency, Reliance Personnel Services, in relation to maternity leave, we wish to clarify our position.
The policy is unfair and does not meet the standards of our commitment to diversity and inclusion especially at a time when the world is calling for gender parity to bridge the gender gap. As a company that has deep respect for transparency, diversity and equal opportunities, we will not tolerate any breaches in respect to our Suppliers Code of Conduct and or / higher standards.
After our discussions with Reliance we have taken immediate action and the only affected employee has been contacted. Going forward Reliance will do the following:
- Pay all female staff on maternity leave their full salary.
- Ensure that all employees return to their jobs after the 3 months maternity leave.
- Allow for shorter working days for nursing mothers at their return to work.
This is in full compliance with Ghana’s Labour Law and Tigo Ghana’s commitment to Diversity and Inclusion as well as our international parent company, Millicom’s commitments which also includes respect for Human Rights.
Diversity, specifically promoting gender diversity is one of the cornerstones of our business strategy and in Ghana we have increased the number of women in senior management positions from 5% in 2013 to 30% in 2015.
At Tigo our aim is to recruit, retain and develop the best talent at every level in the organisation and we want to send a message to all women, whether mothers or not, that we are totally committed to being inclusive.
As a business, we have both short and long term needs and like most others, very much depend on vendors and suppliers to help us to deliver on our objectives. Out-sourcing some of our business services is commonplace and allows us to stay focused on our core business. Using local businesses such as Reliance Personnel Services for staff on contract is therefore not out of the norm.
Today I have asked my team to conduct an in-depth audit of some of our key vendors and suppliers, including Reliance, to ensure strict adherence and compliance to all our Service Level Agreements and Code of Conduct, without exception. This is in addition to our standard supplier monitoring processes.
Signed
Roshi Motman
CEO Tigo Ghana
oh so they knew what was right? Good job madam finally. Recruitment agencies no fuool again hehehehehe