Wananchi Group Holdings owners of Zuku issued retrenchment letters to 50 of its employees on Friday. This followed the issuing of retrenchment notice to all its staff members in May as a precursor to the restructuring.
The staff lay off is due to the impending merger of its loss-making satellite Tv business with its triple play service as a cost cutting measure. This emerged from a board meeting held on February 19th this year where the board resolved to re-integrate the cable and direct to home business. Their satellite Tv business has generally been unable to crack this market which is mostly dominated by Multichoice ( owners of Dstv & Gotv). However, Multichoice is also not resting easy as Naspers who own Multichoice are contemplating selling it off to the MTN Group. This is due to the fact that with changes in technology cheaper alternatives have emerged leading to a drop in clients and revenue.
Those affected by the retrenchment will receive severance pay calculated at 15 days for each year worked, ex-gratia pay of one month for every year worked, accrued leave days untaken, and terminal benefits from the company’s pension scheme.
According to a source at the company, more individuals are set to receive their retrenchment letters this week.