The Industrial Court recently ordered a private college to hand out close to RM1.4 million in compensation to 17 of its former lecturers.
This come after Court chairman Nur Fauzah Mokhtar found that there was no justifiable grounds for Widad College to select and subject the lecturers to retrenchment.
According to FMT, the lecturers had served from four to 20 years with an earning of between RM2,100 and RM3,950 each. On June 30, 2021, they were dismissed from their positions after a three-month notice.
M’sian college ordered to pay RM1.4mil to 17 ex-lecturers
In making her ruling, Nur Fauzah said that Widad Education Sdn Bhd, which operates Widad University College and Widad College, had failed to prove that it had taken “real and significant cost cutting measures” to prevent the retrenchment and didn’t offer alternatives to the sacked lecturers.
She also ruled that that Widad College had conducted the retrenchment in bad faith when it dismissed the lecturers on grounds of redundancy.
None of the company’s witnesses was also able to state conclusively what the retrenchment selection criteria were despite the fact that they all sat in the management committee who made the decision to dismiss the lecturers.
According to a joint statement by the lecturers, they wrote that they were shocked by the news as there were no discussions about the college’s status or financial situation beforehand.
They also claimed that they were forced to use their unused leave without pay for two weeks before losing their jobs.
Following the ruling, lecturers were awarded between RM51,150 and RM114,767 each as compensation in lieu of reinstatement, back wages and unused annual leave.
College denies splurging money on events
The lecturers also alleged that Widad College had spent huge amounts of money organising events from July 2021 until June 2022, citing a corporate dinner party at Sri Manja Boutique Hotel on Dec 16, 2021 as one example.
However, it was flatly denied by the college, who said the funds were collected by the staff club and students.
It also claimed that it had suffered a total of RM19 million in losses for four consecutive years, which was further hampered by low student intake from 2016 to 2020. The only year it made a profit was in 2016.
“The company had been unable to pay the salary of employees as well as those of former employees of Shahputra College, which it had bought over. Monthly tax deductions and EPF and Sosco contributions were also in arrears,” it added.
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