Zimbabwe Rule of Law Journal |33
f. An employee terminated a contract of employment without notice because the new
employer, after a transfer of the business, lowered the conditions and terms of employment.
The provisions of s186 (1) LRA buttress the argument that dismissal includes terminating
on notice or without notice. In other words dismissal is not confined to misconduct hearings
as the Supreme Court implied. The term dismissal is not a common law principle. Grogan
argues that the word dismissal does not occur in the language of the common law.23 Hence
s 12B (1) of the Labour Act that provides the right not to be unfairly dismissed is not to be
interpreted from a common law position. There are two key aspects in s12B (1) of the Labour
Act, namely, the concept of fairness and lawfulness.
The Supreme Court therefore was incorrect to rule that termination on notice is outside the
armpit of dismissal. The South African LRA clearly puts termination on notice in the armpit
of the dismissal. Assuming that one does not want to follow the above reasoning, termination
on notice still will be found to be violating s 65(1) of the Constitution of Zimbabwe. The
violation occurs in respect to two aspects.
First, the right to terminate on notice without compensation does not pass the test of fairness
under ILO Convention (C150).24 Convention 158 governs termination and the concept of
fair termination is enshrined in this convention. Even though Zimbabwe has not signed and
ratified the Convention, Convention 158 has great persuasive value and the courts can rely
on it based on s326 of the Constitution of Zimbabwe. In other words, the Supreme Court
should have followed the decisions of the courts of other jurisdictions where the definition
of fairness in termination have been pronounced. Hence the employees in the Zuva case
terminated on notice without compensation were terminated unfairly.25
23
Ibid 13
24
Termination of Employment Convention, 1982
25
Michelle Olivier, Interpretation of the Constitutional provisions relating to international law, paper based on
doctoral thesis ‘International Law in South African Municipal Law: human rights procedure, policy and practice’
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