Members of the Sierra Leonean public and officials of the Ministry of Labour and Social Security are increasingly worried over the lack or inadequate work place safety standards at G. Shankerdas and Sons Sierra Leone Limited.
The Indian Company which remains the oldest in the country in terms of producing various liquor products is increasingly coming under the spotlight for not adhering to international workplace safety standards.
On the 21st December, 2019 the Company lost one of its workers Sylvester Patrick Sam age, 38.
Patrick had sustained severe burn injuries when a gas canister exploded on him while mending a leaking tank at a customer premise in the West of Freetown.
Nightwacth was the very first to investigate the incident and verify certain issues relating to the death with authorities at the company.
Our investigations had revealed amongst other things that there were no internal systems in place to investigate accidents and fatalities at the company.
An in-depth interview with the Deputy Public Relations Officer had revealed that the company as per international best practice had not subjected the fatality accident to an investigation with a view to discover what went wrong and what positive remedial actions would be taken in future to avert such fatalities.
This medium was also able to also understand that the company also as per best practices do not have systems in place to raise the awareness levels of personnel on work place safety such as tool box meetings, Safe Act Observations or Management Safety Committees to guarantee the safety of workers at the company.
This is why we are still of the view that until and unless the authorities at Shankerdas are able to make their position clear on these breaches we are convince that there are no safety workplace policies at the company or even where they exist they are inadequate and are potential dangers to many Sierra Leoneans working at the company.
Our stance on the matter has according to some local tabloids reports prompted the moribund Ministry of Labour to intervene in the matter.
All of what is happening at these various foreign owned businesses is permeated by the fact that the Ministry of Labour has maintained a laser faire attitude to effectively monitor the human rights records of these companies.
A government that has its flagship project as human capital development should ensure that its human resource is strongly protected from exploitation and abuse.
We are running a series on the company and the subsequent actions from the Ministry of Labour on the circumstances that led to the Death of Sylvester Moribah.
At G. Shankerdas… Workplace Safety systems Compromised
