The Broadcasting, Electronic, Media & Allied Workers’ Union (Bemawu) says many more employees at the SABC will be without jobs than initially anticipated.

The Section 189 process at the SABC was meant to be completed at the end of February, however, the union says there are still around 80 positions that have not been advertised.

Bemawu’s Hannes du Buisson says they estimate that more than 570 staff members will leave the SABC by the end of March, which is almost 300 more than expected.

“There’s a number of positions, most of them critical positions that have not been advertised and it seems like the SABC has no intention of advertising those positions. Some positions were advertised over the weekend by email. Some positions, the deadline has been set very short for people to apply for those positions. There’s going to be a lot of people being put out in the streets that should have been taken up by the organisation and should have been accommodated. The process is unfair and it is flawed,” says Du Buisson.

Meanwhile, the Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) also feels the Section 189 process at the SABC has been flawed.

“There was a process where people were supposed to apply for certain positions and they could not do so because the system at the SABC in terms of applications was not working at the HR level. There are people who were moved from surplus to redundant. That shows you that SABC management is completely not clear of what they are doing. We have 270 people who have applied for voluntary packages, SABC targeted 300 people, we should at a minimum have forceful retrenchments of 30 people,” says  CWU’s Aubrey Tshabalala.

The SABC is expected to respond to the unions’ requests for comment later on Monday.