Key points
- Labour Court finds retrenchments lacked transparency and valid financial basis.
- Judge orders reinstatement and compensation for affected employees.
- Ruling affirms workers’ rights to fair consultation, even during economic crisesÂ
When Thulisile Sithole and her colleagues were told they were being retrenched, it felt less like a business decision and more like a dismissal of their worth. No real answers. No honest dialogue. Just a quiet erasure of 12 livelihoods.
But five years later, the Labour Court has spoken, and its message is clear: workers are not disposable assets. Even in times of crisis, employers are bound by law, fairness and the basic dignity owed to every person who shows up to work.
In June 2020, Sithole and 11 of her co-workers arrived at Chabo and Joubert Air Conditioning (Pty) Ltd to find their futures uncertain. They had been warned months earlier that the company might need to restructure due to financial strain. On 28 January that year, a formal notice was issued, stating that retrenchments were being considered. But what followed was a process that left the workers feeling sidelined, unheard, and ultimately unemployed.
The company claimed that economic hardship made the retrenchments necessary. Yet, as the workers would later argue in court, there was little transparency about the company’s actual financial position. Consultations were brief and lacked substance. Questions went unanswered. Alternatives to dismissal were never seriously explored. For many of the workers, it felt like the decision had already been made, and that the consultation process was just a formality.
A legal battle for dignity
Represented by the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (NUMSA), the group challenged their dismissals in the Johannesburg Labour Court. Their case centred on the argument that the retrenchments were not only procedurally flawed but substantively unjustified. They contended that the company had failed to provide credible financial evidence to support its claims of distress and had not engaged in meaningful consultation, as required by the Labour Relations Act.
On 26 June 2025, Judge M Makhura delivered a judgment that validated their struggle. The court found that the retrenchments were substantively unfair. The company’s financial justifications didn’t hold up under scrutiny, audited records showed profits, not losses. The judge also criticised the employer for failing to explore alternatives to dismissal or to engage with workers in good faith.
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