The National Labour Commission has subpoenaed the Managing Director (MD) of the Gocrest Security Company, Mr George Aggudey, who is also a former presidential candidate of the Convention Peoples Party (CPP), to send his written response in a raging labour case, in which fourteen ex-workers of the company had dragged him to the Commission. The 14 ex-workers had dragged the Managing Director to the Labour Commission over what they claimed to be the failure of his company to pay their severance awards, after years of service to the company. The subpoena came as a result of the failure of the Gocrest MD to respond to earlier complaints sent by the Commission to him. The order, which was signed by the Executive Secretary of the Commission, Mr Edward Briku-Boadu, and dated November 12, 2009, stated: “You are commanded to study the complaint, and send your written response on the matter before the National Labour Commission, Asylum Down, within seven days, notice of which is hereby given to you.” The case has William Ayinsah and Benjamin Sam as petitioners, and Gocrest Security Company as the respondent. The Public Relations Officer of the Labour Commission, Mr Mohammed Affum, in an interview with The Chronicle, said the commission had subpoenaed the respondent, but could not confirm whether Mr Aggudey had sent out his written response, as contained in the subpoena, or not. Explaining why the Commission decided to issue the subpoena, Mr Affum said the commission only issues a writ of subpoena to a party, when the respondent party fails to respond to the commission’s written letter after the fourteen days notice given had elapsed. The 14 ex-workers of Gocrest Security, who had worked for the company for periods ranging from ten to fourteen years, early this year, petitioned the Labor Commission, as a last resort, to compel their former Managing Director, Mr Aggudey, to pay them their end of service benefits due them. The fourteen workers were sent home last year March by the company, through verbal notices. This was after Gocrest failed to give words of assurance to the workers over whether they were going to pay them their end of service benefits, or not. In a petition written by the 14 ex-workers, and addressed to the MD of Gocrest Security, entitled Application for benefit and Payment of 6 months Overtime,’ they wrote, “we want to get you informed that we have starved ourselves and family for the past five months, and want to report the case to the media, if possible, to the dailies, for all the nation to know that we have worked with Gocrest for years. You asked us to go home verbally without any letter, without any benefit, and removed our names from your payroll. We will be glad to hear from you soon, or we will take the necessary action. We need our benefits.” One of the aggrieved workers, William Ayinsah, told The Chronicle that since they (workers) sent the petition to Aggudey to pay them their benefits last year, they had not received any word of assurance from him. According to him, they had written several petitions to Mr Aggudey, as a reminder to pay them their benefits, but all to no avail. Justifying why Gocrest needed to pay them their end of service benefits, the ex-worker noted that since their former employer was paying their SSNIT contributions the management was obliged to pay them for the period they served the company. He showed to The Chronicle the SSNIT contributions Gocrest was paying on their behalf. Source: The Chronicle/Ghana