Reprieve as Mombasa EPZ firm agrees to re-hire sacked 3,000 workers

MOMBASA, KENYA: It was a big relief for over 3,000 sacked Export Processing Zone in Changamwe after the firm agreed to re-hire them ending year-long street protests.

The firm agreed to employ the workers following an intervention by a parliamentary committee.

The workers were sacked last year and have been holding street protest in the area claiming the firm had victimized them because they joined a union.

But the owners of the EPZ, Antex Processing Zone, said that it suspended the employees after the firm closed down 12 of its production lines due to technical hitches.

On Friday the Parliamentary Committee on Labour and Social Welfare Service toured the firm and announced that it had reached an agreement with the owners to re-hire the sacked employees.

"We have engaged with the management and agreed that all those who had been laid off will be absorbed back once the 12 lines in the company resume operation," said Committee chairman Jones Mwagogo Mlolwa (Voi).

The law makers who visited the factory following a petition by Jomvu Mp Badi Twalib, told reporters that eight of the 12 lines that had broken down had been restored