Around 30 people attended the meeting held by the General Workers’ Union at its headquarters in Valletta on Wednesday morning for those employees who are complaining that they have not been selected, despite having more qualifications, experience and skills than some of the people who actually have been employed.
Seven employees have already expressed their intention to take their case to the Ombudsman, sources told The Malta Independent on Sunday.
Ironically, Investments, Industry and Information Technology Minister Austin Gatt, who is responsible for PBS, himself suggested in parliament on Thursday evening that those employees who felt aggrieved should take their case to the Ombudsman.
However, employees who opt to take one of the four early retirement schemes cannot take their case to the Ombudsman. The agreement signed between the government and the GWU on 24 April states that by opting for a retirement scheme, the employee would be making a full and final settlement and thus would have to withdraw all claims against the company.
This clause was not exclusive to the PBS agreement and had been included in other agreements where the government offered early retirement schemes, such as at the shipyards, sources said.
The GWU said on Friday that its lawyers, Dr Aron Mifsud Bonnici and Dr Marvic De Barro, were hearing the complaints by the employees so that the union could present their case in front of the “competent authorities”.
Moreover, the deadline for the closure of the early retirement schemes was extended by two weeks from last Friday to 6 August.
The GWU said it had requested the extension after the employees asked for more time to decide whether to take the schemes or else be re-deployed with the government.
Sources said that the early retirement schemes are also available to those employees who have received an appointment with the “new” PBS.
However, this means that the whole process has now been delayed, causing further frustration for the employees who had expressed their intention of leaving the company but have still not been released by the management.
The results of the second and final internal call for applications were published yesterday week. As a result of this, eight vacancies were filled: five posts of messenger/driver/handyman, one clerk, one journalist/editor and one radio coordinator.
The person employed as journalist/editor is Tony Dimech, who currently works as a director/editor at the news centre, according to sources. In the first internal call for applications, Mr Dimech had applied for the post of news coordinator but was not accepted.
In addition, Peter Cossai was appointed this week as the second news coordinator in the PBS newsroom after the disciplinary proceedings against him were dropped.
Sources said the appointment of Joe Dimech as radio coordinator was shrouded in controversy, with radio veterans like Marlene Abela and Peter Paul Ciantar being left out.
Mr Dimech had initially applied for the post of TV coordinator but that post was given to Nicky Gauci.
There were claims that the first interview board had recommended Ms Abela for the position, but the PBS board of directors opted for a second round of interviews for the post, conducted by a different panel.
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