PHOTO CAPTION: Equator Bottlers Kisumu Disgruntled personnel at Equator Bottlers Limited - a Coca-Cola-affiliated packaging plant in Kisumu County - have raised an outcry against unfavorable working conditions and insufficient salaries.
Writing to this blog on Wednesday, June 22, a staff member at the factory reliably informed us that some union leaders have overstayed their tenures in office and paralyzed all elections.
This has left employees suffering extreme mistreatment at the hands of crooked company executives who do not care to listen to their grievances.
Most members of the workforce are serving long-term contracts and see no convenient exit door.
With the astonishing levels of unemployment currently ravaging the nation, they have opted to keep showing up to what now feels like a slave yard.
The group now desperately seeks intervention from relevant state agencies.
All their calls to the Central Organization of Trade Unions (COTU) headed by Azimio La Umoja brigadier Francis Atwoli have borne no fruit.
Ever since he joined the election campaign trail of Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, rogue corporations and firms have enjoyed unrestricted leeway in oppressing helpless workers.
For better context, check out our "Slavery in Kenya" series where companies like Blowplast , Safepak , Flower City , Orbit Chemicals , Vitafoam , and Chandaria Industries , among many others are heavily mentioned.
They force countless workers to endure slavery-era conditions just to take home peanuts in the name of wages.
This must stop!
Below is the submission forwarded by our source at Equator Bottlers Limited . “Hi, Nyakundi, There is something urgent we need you to address. EBL Coke Kisumu are frustrating workers by underpaying them. Union officials have been in office for over ten years without elections. Please try to help. God have mercy on us people. We are crying in Kisumu. They have contracted most employees for more than ten years. Denis, Nyamita, and manufacturing manager Kilungu are mistreating staffers,” writes the source.