The Bank­ing, In­sur­ance and Gen­er­al Work­ers’ Union (BIG­WU) has ac­cused the CEPEP Com­pa­ny Lim­it­ed and the Gov­ern­ment of dis­guis­ing an em­ploy­ment re­la­tion­ship to de­ny 11,500 work­ers their law­ful rights.

In a state­ment is­sued yes­ter­day, BIG­WU said the mass dis­missal of work­ers on June 27, fol­low­ing the ter­mi­na­tion of 300 CEPEP con­trac­tors, was not mere­ly an ad­min­is­tra­tive de­ci­sion but a “hu­man cri­sis.”

The union said CEPEP’s po­si­tion that the work­ers were em­ployed by con­trac­tors and not the com­pa­ny it­self was “false” and amount­ed to “dis­guised em­ploy­ment.”