Labour Inspectorate Exposes Sexual Exploitation at Dharm Cutting Works Botswana

Dharm’s is headquartered in India, the leading country for diamond sourcing.

After the Botswana Diamond Workers Union (BDWU), a subsidiary of IndustriALL, filed a complaint with the ministry, labour inspectors conducted an investigation at Dharm and interviewed six female workers who were sexually harassed. The inspectors also interviewed three women, who have since left the company due to sexual harassment by the manager who has since been suspended pending an investigation.

According to the inspectors’ report, the forms of sexual harassment alleged against the managing director included rape, inappropriate touching and quid pro quo sexual harassment – which occurs when employment, pay and benefits are promised on the condition that one submit to unwanted sexual advances. In one of the incidents cited in the report, the managing director sexually harassed several diamond cutters after asking them to clean his house. The inspectors said this was in breach of the National Industrial Relations Code of Good Practice (Models Procedures and Agreements) 2006, which defines sexual harassment as “persistent, unsolicited and unwanted sexual advances or suggestions from one person to another. This is a clear case of sexual harassment and the perpetrator is the managing director.”

The inspectors wrote that the manager used his financial power to sexually harass the employees, in violation of the company’s employee handbook. The handbook, which is supposed to stop sexual harassment, states that “sexual harassment includes conduct of a sexual nature, including unwanted jokes, touching, comments, pornographic displays, or the like that unreasonably interferes with an employee’s ability to perform his or her job because of the hostile environment.”

Furthermore, the inspection condemned the involvement of the general manager in the investigation into sexual harassment and asked how an alleged perpetrator could play a dual role as “player and referee”. “By attending the proceedings of an investigation against him, he advanced the findings of the investigation and declared the process null and void,” according to the report sent to Dharm.

In addition to sexual harassment, the inspection report also noted that Dharm had reinstated employment conditions that the company had previously revoked without consulting the union.

Dominic Obusitse Mapoka, President of the BDWU, said:

said Paule France Ndessomin, IndustriALL Regional Secretary for Sub-Saharan Africa.

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