At least 105 former Barclays Bank of Kenya employees were dealt a severe blow after the Court of Appeal reversed a High Court decision to award them Sh600 millionfollowing their sacking a decade ago.
Ms Agnes Wachu Wamae and 104 others were waiting for the appellate court decision with bated breath until it became clear the award had been struck out.
Three appellant judges declared the award was not legally justified.
The former employees were declared redundant in December 2010.
But as they left their jobs, they questioned the manner in which the computation of their final dues was conducted.
They were later awarded the money by Justice Mathew Nduma Nderi of the Employment and Labour Court who found that they had been discriminated.
The judge noted that the bank violated Section 40 of Employment Act, 2007 which requires employers to grant sacked workers proper terminal dues.
“In its own discretion, the bank granted the claimants one-and-a-half months’ salary for each completed year of service and also used its discretion to cap the number of completed years payable to each of the former bankers,” he said.
The lender said each of them was paid their send off package. The bank further said each employee was liable to pay outstanding loans with the bank to be offset through the exit package. Furthermore, all terminal benefits, including payment in lieu of leave was paid out to them.
It said they were fraudulently paid for 16 years, which they had not served, and that others who worked 40 years were denied their hard-earned money.
Justice Nderi said, “It is not in doubt that all the employees who worked more than 16 years, some even up to 40 years, were deprived of large amounts which they were lawfully entitled to by the fact of their long service.”
The judge also pronounced that those who worked more than 16 years were discriminated against.
Accordingly, the 105 claimants succeeded in their demand and each of them was awarded as prayed in the suit.
The High court judge directed they be paid dues computed from January 31, 2011 when they were retrenched.
The amounts were to be paid with interest at a court rate of 12 per cent from the time of exit.
But Nderi’s ruling was dismissed by the appellate court for lack of merit.
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