Chinese company Unik Construction has dismissed one of its managers, following accusations of sexual harassment in northern Namibia.
The company, however, denies these allegations, saying the woman involved demanded a salary increase in exchange for her silence.
Unik Construction insists it has refused this demand, leading to the woman’s termination.
The company also built Swapo’s N$1-billion head office in Windhoek.
The harassment incident allegedly happened in the Ohangwena region, where Unik Construction is implementing a N$248-million contract for the Ohangwena II Welfield Water Supply Schemes.
The project is funded by the African Development Bank.
Unik Construction human resource manager Vernon Thompson last week confirmed the dismissal of Wang Hong Wang who worked as the foreman at Ondobe reservoir.
“The human resources officers on site took immediate action and started with investigations. On 7 September, I received an email from our top management. This guy was dismissed,” Thompson yesterday told The Namibian.
The Ondobe Police Station commander refused to comment on the matter yesterday.
The accused was not reachable for comment.
The involved woman, who cannot be named to protect her identity, says she was sexually harassed by her boss last month.
She says the incident took place at Ondobe, where the company is currently constructing a water reservoir for NamWater.
The alleged victim says the day she was harassed, she was on site to address a worker grievance.
While there, she approached one of the accused managers to discuss the matter, who then sexually harassed her, she says.
“I was embarrassed. I asked him why he did that to me. He merely laughed in response,” the woman says.
She describes the incident as disturbing, especially since she provided employees, including the alleged perpetrator, with training on sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment in August.
The woman says the training emphasised the company’s zero-tolerance policy on sexual exploitation, abuse and harassment.
She says she reported the incident to the police in the Ohangwena region.
According to her, project manager Jason Lee and site agent Bandile Bennett initially apologised on the manager’s behalf and promised to conduct a disciplinary hearing.
Lee last week referred The Namibian to the company’s human resources department.
The woman says the human resources department unlawfully obtained her witness statement from the police without her permission.
DENIAL
Thompson says sexual harassment is a regarded as major transgression at the company, and the accused has been dismissed.
He says one of the employees at the site discouraged the woman from reporting the case to the police, advising her to rather report it to the company’s human resources department.
Thompson says the woman has been threatening to share the matter with the media.
“She said would take this information to the newspaper, and I said that will put the company’s reputation at risk, because the company acted on what we saw was a serious offence,” he says.
He says the company’s standards are on an international level.
“If you look at our client and the funder of the project, these are big guys, and if we lose this contract, it means we can get blacklisted,” he says.
Thompson says he has told the woman to consider withdrawing the case from the police.
He says there is a need to protect the company’s reputation.
Thompson has confirmed that the company has obtained the woman’s statement from the police.
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