Thursday 23rd February 2012

Employment, Pensions & Benefits

Sebalu & Lule is the first full service law firm in the country to set up a fully specialized and functional employment law practice and which has since obtained due recognition from Chambers Global: A Guide To The World’s Leading Law Firms (2011) as a niche practice. We have an experienced team of professionals working exclusively on employment and benefits matters led by Moses Segawa.

Our employment practice is currently retained by a number of multi-national organisations, local corporate entities and international non-governmental organisations and has guided clients through the difficult transition from the employment-at-will to the termination-for-just-reasons dispensation imposed by the Employment Act 2006. Our team has navigated clients through the minefields of onerous statutory disciplinary processes and mass lay-offs (collective terminations) and have presided over the termination of up to 1500 employees in total without any residual litigation. The practice also continues to take a proactive role in empowering clients to deal with the new dispensation of the law ushered in by the labour laws of 2006 by facilitating workshops and issuing routine legal papers and compliance checklists.

The growth of our employment portfolio has been tremendous with the unit registering instructions even from competition-serviced clients.

Our pension practice offers legal advisory ranging from benefit set-up, drafting of trust deeds and rules, registration of schemes and trustee advisory services to several retirement benefit schemes and their sponsoring employers. Presently, the practice is heavily involved in guiding several retirement benefits schemes and their sponsoring employers on their response to Government efforts to liberalize the pension sector through the enactment of The Uganda Retirement Benefits Authority Act 2011 and prospective enactment of The Retirement Benefits Sector Liberalization Bill 2011.

Our alliance with Juris East Africa and DLA Piper continues to give us a cross-jurisdictional reach which enables us to deliver holistic legal services to our regional clients with operations in the various East African countries.

The practice group’s services range from legal advisory to litigation and include:

Training:  We offer training services to our clients on how to structure and operate a compliant human resource framework in the context of new legislation through seminars and customized workshops.

Legal Advisory/ Consultancy:  We advise our clients on a wide range of non-contentious employment law matters including corporate restructuring, redundancies, employee share option schemes and contracts drafting.

Pensions and Retirement Benefit Schemes: We have advised and continue to advise our clients routinely on how to structure pension and other retirement benefits schemes with minimum exposure to the client.

Human Resources Policies Formulation: We review and redraft Human Resources Manuals to make them compliant with Uganda’s various labour laws. 

Disciplinary Hearings: We offer our clients all kinds of support in conducting a flawless disciplinary hearing. This ranges from training, drafting disciplinary summons, preparing for the disciplinary hearing and, where necessary, representing the employer at the hearing.

Corporate Immigration: We process a wide range of immigration facilities on behalf of our clients’ expatriate employees and assignees. We act as Co-Counsel in Uganda to Fragomen, the world’s leading corporate immigration practice. Fragomen has been recognized as the Corporate Immigration Law Firm of the Year for the past seven consecutive years (2004-2011) by The International Who's Who of Business Lawyers.

Industrial Relations:  We assist our corporate clients in dealing with this routinely complex subject by designing policies that are workable in the context of the new law and yet are well regulated to avoid disrupting business. We assist our clients in drafting and negotiating recognition and collective agreements with labour unions.

Occupational Safety & Health/Workers’ Compensation:  We have come up with a summary and checklists of the over 100 statutory duties imposed by the Occupational Safety and Health Act of 2006  to enable our clients meet compliance standards of  to avoid invalidating their Workers Compensation Insurance. We also advise our clients on the reporting requirements of injuries at the workplace which occasionally expose their executive officers and directors to criminal prosecution.

Litigation:  The passing of the new Employment Act introduced the District Labour Courts as the Courts of first instance and the Industrial Court, meaning that all labour complaints are directed there. We appear in all these Courts on behalf of our clients and any other fora associated to employment.

In pensions, notable present and past briefs include:

  • Currently advising the provident fund of a global petroleum, oil & gas company on the effects of the Uganda Retirements Benefits Regulatory Authority Act 2011 and the prospective Retirement Benefits Sector Liberalization Bill.

  • Currently advising the provident fund of a global petroleum, oil & gas company on the effect of a new tax regime on existing benefits and the proposed prohibition of investment of scheme income outside of East Africa.

  • Currently advising a private non-profit organization working in public health on the formulation of a trust deed and reviewing its service level agreements.

  • Currently advising a leading microfinance institution on the possible modes of restructuring its retirement benefits scheme.

  • Retained by the pension trust fund of a leading financial institution to advise on all legal aspects arising.

  • Reviewed the draft supplementary trust deed formulated by a specialist retirement benefits services company for the pension trust fund of a leading financial institution.

  • Advised the pension trust fund of a leading financial institution on the appointment of various service providers including investment advisers, the custodian and administrators.

  • Advised a leading financial institution in its role as a sponsoring employer under the pension trust fund.

  • Advised a leading global insurance company with a subsidiary in Uganda on the migration of the provident scheme from the sponsoring employer’s books of accounts and on the options of obtaining autonomy for provident fund.

  • Advised a global petroleum, oil & gas company on the dissolution of a Defined Benefits Pension Fund and the set-up of a Defined Contributions Provident Fund.

  • Conducted training and appraisal sessions for the provident fund of a global petroleum, oil & gas company on its role under the forthcoming pensions legal regime.

  • Formulated trust deed & rules for the retirement scheme of a leading microfinance institution and advised on possible restructruring options.

  • Advised the trustees of the retirement benefits scheme of a leading soft drinks manufacturer on the formulation of the trust deed and reviewed various service provider agreements including the administrator agreement, custodial agreement and the fund manager agreements.

  • Formulated the supplementary trust deed and rules for the provident fund of a global Christian relief, development and advocacy organization.

  • Formulated the trust deed and regulations for a leading insurance company’s staff benefits scheme and advised on the scheme set-up.

  • Advised the pension scheme of a leading financial institution on the effect of the Uganda Retirements Benefits Regulatory Authority Act 2011 and the prospective Retirement Benefits Sector Liberalization Bill and conducted a training session for the provident fund trustees on their role under the forthcoming pensions legal regime.

  • Advised the management of a global anti-poverty charitable organisation on the closure of their pension scheme.

  • Advised an independent and privately owned insurance group based in South Africa on the regulatory environment of East Africa with respect to retirement benefits and accompanying tax and insurance aspects.

  • Advised the country’s principal electricity generation company on the pension due to former staff members under the Electricity Act and its verification and payment.

  • Advised an independent, humanitarian non-governmental organisation based in Norway on the registration options of prospective retirement benefits schemes, aspects of custody of assets of the scheme and on elements of taxation of contributions to the scheme.

  • Advised a diplomatic mission on the retirement benefits of its Ugandan employees.

In employment, notable present and past briefs include:

  • Currently conducting a labour laws compliance audit on a global petroleum, oil & gas company with operations in Uganda.

  • Advised two leading financial institutions on the social security liability of their expatriate staff.

  • Advised the country’s leading tobacco company on managing casual employees under the current labour law dispensation.

  • Advised the country’s leading tobacco company on the formation of an ideal corporate entity in which to channel their social corporate responsibility programme.
  • Presently retained as employment advisor by the human resource department of a leading financial institution in Uganda.

  • Presently retained as employment advisor to a number of the firm’s clients across the sectors of banking, finance, energy, oil and gas and mining, petroleum supply, power generation, telecommunications, insurance, tobacco manufacture and processing, business development and finance, private equity and international non-governmental development organizations.

  • Advised a global independent power producer with operations in Uganda on the synchronization of standard contracts of employment with local labour legislation, reviewed disciplinary procedures and advised the client on compliance requirements under the Occupational Safety & Health Act.

  • Advised a leading confectionary and soft-drinks company on the collective termination of over 1000 casual labourers with no residual litigation.

  • Advised a leading insurance company on a corporate restructuring which culminated into the collective termination of over 13 employees. Regulatory approval was required for this exercise and no residual litigation accrued.

  • Advised a leading charitable organisation on the redundancy of over 15 staff members following a project phase-out and obtained regulatory approval for this process.

  • Advised a diplomatic mission on the phasing out of its guarding division and the transfer of employment to a specialist private security company.

  • Represented the principal electricity generation company in the Supreme Court in a suit by ex-employees claiming over UGX 5 billion in benefits.

  • Successfully defended a leading charitable organisation before the High Court in a suit by an ex-employee claiming over UGX 100 million.

  • Currently representing a leading forest conservation company in the High Court against a UGX 100 million damages claim for wrongful termination.

CONTACT PARTNER
Moses Segawa