International workers’ rights body sets labour centre in Malawi

The International Centre for Trade Union Rights (ICTRUR), an organisation that fights the rights of workers worldwide through its affiliate, the Malawi Congress for Trade Union (MCTU), has established a labour centre called African Workers Rights Now in Malawi.

The Centre’s Board Member and Supervising Counsellor, Sunduzwayo Madise, said in an interview with APA on Friday that the centre will be tasked with fighting for the rights of workers, primarily in the security sector.

"We shall be providing free consultation, legal advice and legal representation to guards and all workers who cannot afford to engage a lawyer or pay legal fees when their bosses abuse them," he said.

He said the MCTU had carried out research recently on the conditions of service applicable in the security service sector. The findings showed that most security guards were lowly paid, worked for longer hours without being paid overtime allowance and were highly abused by their bosses, most of who had grown rich from the virtual slave labour conditions.