No Such Thing as a Secure Job

This story was shared by Mokokoma Mokhonoana. His narrative is as follows.

This story should actually be credited, the most, as the inspiration behind my creating this website. I would like to honour the story by making it the first. So, here goes:

I was heading towards the lifts, of the new apartment that I just moved into, when I ran into the man responsible for keeping the flats clean. A “cleaner” he is labeled.

By then, we never really conversed. But we have exchanged a few “Hello’s” before.

I greeted him. And then, I stopped for a bull session (that is, “… a small talk”).

After I answered his question, “So, where is home?,” he ended up telling me that he was actually “that side” the weekend before. He went there to meet his father for the first time. And that, he is 50 years old.

He then told me that he has been “this side” (of the country) for almost 21 years.

He has been working where I currently reside (in Pretoria) for just under two years. Before that, he worked for some company in Johannesburg.

Apparently, that “some company” that he has been working for, for over 19 years, got liquidated.

The worse part being that he has never, to this day, received a cent from the company.

He and his former colleagues have been going to hearings for the last four years, trying to get their pension money (or whatever they call the money that he is owed).

People have a habit of thinking that the longer that one works for a company, the more “secure” their job is. Well, I think that that’s utter illusional nonsense.

I found this story to be a perfect real-life demonstration that sort of supports points that I made in the writing, “Job Security is a Fantasy,” found on page 9 of the book.

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