The Constitutional Court is expected to deliver its judgment in the case of nine employees of a Gauteng firm, dismissed for singing a struggle song during their strike in 2013, which management believes contained racial lyrics.
The song has the lyrics “My mother rejoices when I hurt a boer”.
The East Rand based company Duncanmec lost the case against the workers’ dismissals at the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and Arbitration (CCMA) and the Labour Court – and was ordered to reinstate all nine employees.
The manufacturing company Duncanmec argues that political protest songs, previously directed at the Apartheid regime, have no place in the modern workplace.
It says the song which it deems racially charged was sung in the face of management in a disrespectful and aggressive way.
However, labour union National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa (Numsa) which represents the dismissed workers contends that Duncan met failed to demonstrate that the employment relationship had irreparably broken down.
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