Social effects of job losses

The wave of job losses triggered by a Supreme Court ruling which validated termination of contracts via three-month notices could prove to be a blessing in disguise, a social commentator has said.

Professor Claude Mararike, a lecturer in Rural Development and Indigenous Knowledge at the University of Zimbabwe, said some of the workers who lost their jobs will transform themselves into successful businesspeople.

“The wave of job losses cannot be said to be a national disaster and an unusual exercise. We are going to see some of the affected workers converting their problems into windows of prosperity. If people are not challenged, they might not realise their full potential,” Prof Mararike said.

Added Prof Mararike: “As Zimbabweans, we are not new to these kind of challenges. We faced worse challenges during the colonial era and prevailed. We are a determined people who seem to thrive where there are problems. A nation that does not face challenges might not thrive.”

Prof Mararike said there was a likelihood of a surge in the number of people that will attend church services to seek divine intervention.

“The number of people seeking spiritual healing will increase. It is a normal thing for distressed people to turn to God for solutions,” Prof Mararike said.

Prof Mararike, however, said job losses often birthed negative social and economic consequences.

Some affected workers, he noted, might resign to fate and lose interest in life, resulting in them not taking care of themselves and their families.

“If a breadwinner loses a job, that person loses the ability to look after him/herself and the family. That person’s status in society is reduced from wealth to poverty and that person becomes a burden to relatives, friends and society.”

According to Prof Mararike, those that lose their jobs would be turned from “assets into liabilities”.

“Some affected workers will ask for help from wherever, which is not a permanent solution. Others will have to find someone or something to blame for the situation that they will be in. Some of the affected workers will flee the country, resulting in the dislocation of families,” added Prof Mararike.

He said there is likely going to be an increase in such deviant behavior such as prostitution and crime.

The ripple effects of the job losses are already being felt in virtually all facets of life. Mr Ngoni Katsvairo, secretary-general of the Greater Harare Association of Commuter Operators representing some 1 000 kombi owners, said the effects of the job losses are already being felt in the transport sector.

“As commuter omnibus operators, we rely on people who commute to work. Following the job losses, the number of commuters has decreased significantly. The ripple effects of the job losses are too ghastly to contemplate,” he said.

A snap survey by The Sunday Mail Extra showed that congestion had eased in Harare’s Central Business District, though this could also be attributable to the municiplaity’s on-going relocation of vendors to designated areas.

Homeowners could also lose out as tennants move in search of cheaper lodgings or even to rural areas.

There are fears that some parents might not be able to pay school fees for their children next term, and in particular in January 2016. The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) has said the current job terminations have led to a number of stress-related deaths among those that were recently retrenched.

The ZCTU secretary- general, Mr Japhet Moyo, was widely quoted in the local media warning of an increase in stress-related deaths if the current impasse between workers and their employers is not resolved.

According to the ZCTU, stress-related deaths are not new in Zimbabwe.

In 2011, some of the RBZ workers who were retrenched without receiving compensation were said to have succumbed to stress-related deaths.

RBZ worker Clive Tinashe Gwara allegedly hanged himself after failing to endure months without receiving his compensation. On July 29, 2015 Mr Patrick Nyandoro lost furniture stock worth US$2 500 in the Glen View Home Industry Complex inferno. He died a day later and his widow, Mrs Regina Nyandoro, believes the death was precipitated by the demise of his furniture enterprise.