POPCRU resorts to victimisation – Solidarity

Trade union Solidarity today said that the Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (POPCRU) is victimising members it, as one of the recognised trade unions in the Department of Correctional Services (DCS), should be protecting.

This follows after POPCRU has been railing against senior officials from the Department of Correctional Services in the Western Cape, accusing them of racism. POPCRU has availed itself as amicus curiae and has brought legal argument against ten DCS members in the case Solidarity has brought against the DCS that will be heard in the Constitutional Court on Wednesday 18 November 2015.

“POPCRU’s accusation that senior officials of the Department of Correctional Services in the Western Cape are racist and are using employment equity to drive their own agenda is a cheap attempt to undermine the coloured community in the Western Cape, a community fighting for equality and justice,” Head of Solidarity’s Centre for Fair Labour Practices, Dirk Groenewald, said.

POPCRU, which has been fighting for the implementation of the national demographics in the Western Cape since 2013, realise that they are losing the battle and are now ready to turn to victimisation tactics to silence our members,” Groenewald said.

“We are cautioning POPCRU to refrain from victimising our members. Should the DCS heed these unfounded demands from POPCRU Solidarity will again approach the courts,” Groenewald said.

Issued by Dirk Groenewald, Head: Centre for Fair Labour Practices, Solidarity, 12 November 2015