ZAMBIA Law and Practice Contributed by: Joseph Jalasi, Mailesi Undi, Chama Simbeye and Wana Chinyemba, Dentons Eric Silwamba, Jalasi & Linyama Legal Practitioners
10. Employment and Labour 10.1 Employment and Labour Framework The primary legislation governing employment rela - tionships in Zambia is the Employment Act No 3 of 2019. It provides a framework that governs all employ - ment relationships, contains mandatory terms that every employment contract must satisfy, and specifies how to enforce employee rights. Other notable legislation governing employment rela - tionships includes the Industrial and Labour Relations Act. The concept of formalised representations under Zambian law is recognised by the existence of trade unions. Section 5 (1)(b) of the Industrial and Labour Relations Act is clear that an employee has the right to be a member of a trade union of that employee’s choice. Employees also have the right to choose whether or not to join a union. Therefore, it is not man - datory for employees to be represented; they are only represented if they choose to be members of a trade union. Where a trade union represents an employee, the employee must be consulted with respect to the conclusion or extension of collective agreements in relation to collective redundancies and transfers to another employer. 10.2 Employee Compensation An employee’s compensation is in the form of cash, pension/retirement benefits and statutory benefits, as provided for under the employee’s contract of employment. In an acquisition or change of control, the employer must first obtain consent from the employees and authorisation from the labour commissioner before transferring any employees to the new employer. In the event that the employee does not consent to the transfer, the employee’s contract of employment will be terminated, and the employee will be entitled to severance pay. Before endorsing a contract of employment to which the employee has consented, the Labour Commission must ensure that the employer and employee have entered into an agreement to either carry forward the
employee’s liabilities or to pay the employee any out - standing liabilities due to the employee prior to the transfer of that employee’s contract of employment. The Supreme Court of Zambia stated that a change in ownership of shares cannot result in the corporate entity becoming a new employer; it will still be the same employer and will be bound by employment contracts. Employees are not mandated to transfer their con - tracts. Any transfer of an employee’s contract requires consent from that employee. Where an employee does not consent to the transfer, that employee’s contract will be terminated immedi - ately, and the employee will be entitled to severance pay. 10.3 Employment Protection See 10.2 Employee Compensation . For unionised employees, a collective agreement should be signed with the trade union, and consent should be obtained from the Labour Commission. 11. Intellectual Property and Data Protection 11.1 Intellectual Property Considerations for Approval of FDI This does not apply in Zambia. 11.2 Intellectual Property Protections Trade Marks Zambia is considered to provide strong intellectual property protection. However, it is debated that the protection of trade marks has limitations (such as the issue of the Zambian trade mark law not recognising service marks in the Nice classification Zambia from classes 35 to 45). Trade mark proprietors seeking to register trade marks in respect of services have to reg - ister their trade marks in the goods class most closely associated with the relevant services. A further limitation of the current Trademarks Act is that it does not enable the proprietor of a registered trade mark to rely on a trademark registration to pro -
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