Carlo Petersen
MORE concerns have been raised about the way Social Development MEC Albert Fritz treats social workers in the province.
A newly established union, the South African Social Services Union (Sassu), slated Fritz yesterday for the “degrading manner” in which he treats his workers.
This follows an article published in the Cape Times earlier this month after e-mail correspondence had been leaked, showing that Fritz had threatened to lodge insubordination charges against “any staff members who participate(d)” in an event hosted by Social Development Minister Bathabile Dlamini last month.
In a statement titled “Social Work and Social Service Professionals should not be used as political play by immature politicians”, Sassu said Fritz’s “autocratic manner” is reminiscent of the apartheid era when the social services profession had been used as “a political play ball”.
Union spokesperson Andre Lewaks said: “We would like the MEC to explain or to give reasons for his insensitive instructions to lodge insubordination charges against staff.
“We would also like to remind him that as a profession, we are not going to allow him or anyone else to prescribe which stakeholders we need to work with and what services we need to render to our clients in order to address their needs.
“Moreover, it has become evident that Fritz has a tendency to instruct workers not to support activities that are organised by national government.”
Lewaks added that instructing workers not to work with national government forced them to work against the department’s ethical code.
“We request Fritz apologises to the profession, the community of Beaufort West and SA in general.
“We also request the MEC to refrain from perpetrating such unprofessional conduct in communicating with social service professionals and to stop threatening workers with disciplinary actions and preventing them from working with all spheres of government, and to serve the best interest of poor and vulnerable communities.
“We also request a separate meeting with the MEC to discuss measures to restore the harm to the profession.”
Fritz’s spokesperson, Sihle Ngobese, said: “The organisation is more than welcome to contact the department to schedule a meeting with the head of department.”
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