By Staff Reporter
The Progressive Association of Lesotho Teachers (PALT) is embroiled in allegations of swindling more than 200 teachers out of their hard-earned money, in dubious monthly deductions termed ‘membership fees’, this publication can reveal.
The stinging allegations have surfaced following a request by a group of teachers from across the country to terminate their membership with the association. But the association, a breakaway from the Lesotho Association of Teachers (LAT), continues to deduct membership fees and PALT insurance policy contributions.
theReporter is in possession of the list of teachers who have pulled out of the association citing a myriad of reasons for their stoppage of membership.
The subscription fee for the association’s membership stands at M25 in a month for an individual tutor.
An investigation by this publication has revealed that despite their notifying the association’s management about their membership stoppage effective from last June, deductions for such membership were made in July.
The likelihood is that such deductions are to be made further this month contrary to their wish.
For July, the association unduly allowed deductions totaling M5 000 to be made from teachers’ salaries although they had notified the association to stop doing so in June.
In their letter addressed to the PALT on June 22 2021, the teachers wrote to cancel their membership with the association with immediate effect. They requested that their subscription fee to be deducted from their salaries in June to pay for July subscription be their last payment to serve as notice to the association.
The reasons advanced for the cancellation were that “they are not satisfied with the way PALT is handling teachers’ affairs in terms of negotiating their dissatisfaction with the government.”
The issue emanated from teachers’ demands for a spike in their monthly pay, a move that brought them to loggerheads with the government resulting in a pro-longed teachers’ nationwide strike in 2019. The action saw several schools closing their doors to learners in both primary and high schools by three teachers’ labour organisations.
“The association has not respected their rights of teachers; when they tried to terminate their membership over the years as individuals, the association denied them that and has continued to deduct subscription from their salaries by force.
“The teachers have lost interest in the association and therefore demand that it stops all payment deductions from them to it, be it subscriptions or PALT insurance policies. The listed teachers have no loans with PALT or any of its affiliates,” the teachers said in a letter signed by the grouping’s secretary ‘Makabelo Mafantiri and its coordinator Mangubeni Dlamini.
The teachers explicitly added furiously: “If for any reasons PALT has unresolved issues with the listed members of teachers or this group as a whole that prohibits the cancellation, it can ally its grievances with the coordinator of the group by requesting an appointment with her and the secretary of the group. This shall be done before the deductions for July subscriptions are made.”
Due to PALT’s failure to act on their plea, the teachers threatened to take the association to “the courts of law for its injustices.”
Our investigation found out that their request has landed in the offices of the director of the teaching service department (TSD) who, the publication learned, invited the PALT to a meeting in bid to reach an amicable solution to the matter.
According to the legislation, the TSD director is the secretary of the teaching service commission (TSC) which oversees the teaching service profession in both primary and high schools. The TSD ensures daily administration of teachers’ affairs and is their pay master.
In his subsequent letter, TSD director Nathaniel Motaba, said his office was in receipt of a plea to intervene between the PALT and the disgruntled teachers over the deductions from their salaries. He clearly informed the association that failure to act, would “lead them to institute legal action against the teaching service department.”
Motaba suggested: “Among other things, the teachers’ complaint is predicated on the following as seen on their letter dated 22 June 2021; not satisfied with the way of handling their affairs, not seeing the association heeding the requested termination of their membership and losing interest in the association.”
The meeting was scheduled for July 13 as an attempt to reach an amicable conclusion and avoid unnecessary litigation.
The publication was reliably informed that the meeting took place and was attended by representatives from the PALT and the teachers group.
Motaba has since confirmed that indeed his office received the complaint from the group of teachers, triggering him to convene a meeting between the two parties.
“The teachers sought the intervention of the TSD as the paymaster that facilitates deductions. In line with the Education Act I am responsible for the affairs of the teaching profession as the secretary of the TSC which appoints teachers. But the PALT representative contested that I had no locus standi and that a court case has been opened,” Motaba explained.
He said his office was aware of a company known as CIDAS that is responsible for the salary deductions for public servants, including teachers. Such work, he added, was removed from government treasury resulting in government losing a portion of the deductions.
“I am still pursuing the matter because my office has been asked to intervene. It is part of my job to solve the problem by finding out if anything untoward occurred,” Motaba told the publication.
According to Motaba, the meeting did not bear any fruits as it abruptly ended with no clear way forward.
He said he had asked the PALT to furnish his office with details of the court case and the membership form but the association has since not complied.
We also discovered that Motaba has written a report about the impasse to the education ministry regarding the developments. He has also sought clarity about CIDAS from the accountant general which he emphasized was not known to both the teachers and the TSD.
He urgently appealed to the accountant general to “assist with information to shed light on the engagement of an entity CIDAS (said to be the one having access to teachers stop order and able to deduct teachers’ salaries).”
The request, according to the letter to the state purse controller, was made in the backdrop of the TSD failure to get a credible and legal authority empowering CIDAS to handle deductions.
“What complicates matters for us to respond accordingly to teachers is that they only know TSD as their pay master in terms of the law and do not know and have never had any interaction with CIDAS. Equally interesting is that nobody in the department knows this entity except that it is there,” Motaba’s letter said.
He alerted the accountant general that PALT was not cooperating as it had reneged from its undertaking to provide the department with requisite documents and had “lied that there is a court case barring us from intervening.”
The accountant general ‘Malehlohonolo Mahase told theReporter on Tuesday she received an enquiry about CIDAS from the TSD.
She said CIDAS was an entity entrusted with responsibility to effect salary deductions for all the public servants, after it had secured the tender to perform such work for the treasury in a five-year period.
She promised that a meeting is scheduled for Monday next week between her office and both the education ministry human resource and its accountant “in order to see and understand the problem and how to solve it.”
At the time of going to press, CIDAS was not on the list of companies registered with the ministry of trade, raising suspicions about its real existence.
A source from the ministry said this week the ministry was aware of the saga and was receiving the needed attention.
The group’s coordinator, Dlamini, confirmed their request for stoppage of deductions but their request is falling on deaf ears with PALT continuing to receive their subscriptions.
This, according to her, is due to the unsatisfactory way the association was handling their affairs such as demands for salary increases during the previous teacher strike. She said the affected members had clearly informed PALT of their immediate pulling out of the association.
“The law allows for a right to freedom of association. Why should PALT steal this right from us. We requested them(PALT) to stop deductions of subscriptions but they have not done so,” strongly warned Dlamini, a teacher at the Thamae Lesotho Evangelical Church of Southern Africa (LECSA) Primary School.
She vehemently denied knowledge of any court case opened either by the group or the PALT arguing that its representative at the meeting had misled the TSD.
She said her membership with another teacher association ended in 2017 when she requested a cessation of deduction of the subscription fee through a stop order arrangement.
In a move that sent the publication from pillar to post PALT organizer, Koali Koali, referred the publication to the association’s officer identified only as ‘Mampe saying she was responsible for facilitating salary deductions from teachers. For her part, ‘Mampe referred this writer to Koali who she said was the one in a position to comment on the issues.
