Zimbabwe Occupational Health and Safety Law Analysis: Personal Perspective

Law analysis in the field of occupational health and safety takes various forms which include administration and hazard based law analysis. In administration law analysis, issues regarding administration of law are discussed. In this manner it helps to clearly spell out weakness to avoid mixing out of issues.

Occupational health and safety laws in Zimbabwe are fragmented. There is Factories and Works Act 14:08 of 1976 with 8 regulations namely Registration and control (RGN 262), General Regulations (RGN 263), Building, Structural and Excavation Work Regulations(RGN 264), Escalators and Excavation Regulations (RGN 278) Boiler Regulations (RGN 279) Machinery Regulations (RGN 302), Pressure vessel Regulations (RGN 303)and Electrical Regulations (RGN 304). In addition to that there is NSSA Act 17:04, NSSA (Accident prevention and workers’ compensation scheme) Regulations SI 68 of 1990, Pneumoconiosis Act (Cap 15:08), Radiation Protection SI 62 of 2011 and Labour Relations Act 28:01 of 1996. There is need for consolidation Factories and works, NSSA, Pneumoconiosis and Radiation protection Acts in order to reduce fragmentation of law. This problem usually lead to confusion in the jurisdiction of authority on the administration of law. More so it also causes same issues to be addressed different Acts which creates confusion for example Factories and Works Act 14; 08 of 1976 section 14 requires accidents reporting to NSSA to be done if the worker is has not reported to work for 3 days, however NSSA (Accident Prevention and Compensation Scheme) SI 68 of 1990 requires such accidents to be reported after a day.

 Due to fragmentation of law there is no clear jurisdiction of powers in given by Acts for administration of law. This can be solved by having one national institute having structural board that govern occupational health and safety in Zimbabwe. Currently we have NSSA board which is given power by NSSA Act 17:04 from section 3-12 which mainly deals with occupational health and safety issues from factories and partially mining industry. There is a Pnuemnoconiosis board which is given power by Pnuemnoconiosis Act 15:08 from section 4-14. This board sit for dust related issues in Zimbabwe, including factories. There is replication of powers which can lead to lapses in enforcement of law hence can be a cause of increasing accident levels in Zimbabwe.

The trend in major developed countries is to limit the number of statutory instruments and to promote the publication by government agencies or specialized professional bodies of directives, codes of practice and voluntary standards, which are more flexible and can be updated more easily(Alli 2008). This approach fosters prevention but does not in any way prevent the enactment of specific regulations where strict measures are required to control serious occupational hazards. Standards, specifications and codes of practice issued by national standards organizations or professional or specialized institutions are generally not binding, but in some cases they have been given the force of law by the competent authority (Alli 2008). This lightens the lawmaker’s assignment however it may increase administration load for enforcement of such standards but protection of workers can be achieved.

More so, National Social Security board mainly constitute individuals from administrative background. There is need to have a qualification regulation, which tell the employer who you are professionally not employee to tell us who he/she is professionally. This will help tertiary education institutes to coin up programmes in such a way those students will qualify in relevant fields especially in occupational health and safety. This proposed regulation can be governed ministry of labour. There is need to have a competency board within NSSA which certifies every occupational health and safety practioner in Zimbabwe. This will reduce accidents as competent personnel will be in industry dealing with occupational health and safety at source. This institute should have a system which allows 2 years of renewing their membership through writing an exam to check level of progressing in knowledge of occupational health and safety practioner. The national Board on Occupational Health and Safety should mainly constitute members who are chartered practioner from various fields of occupational health and safety. This means that board members should have at least 10 years of experience in a specific field of occupational health and safety. This includes individuals from various industries including consultancy, where administrative professionals should take less of the seats in the composition of the National Social Security Board. 

Chief inspector shall be the chairman of the board at national level, not to give the powers to the minister to appoint the chairman of the board. This can lead to lack of competency in the board as the minister can appoint anyone based on political interest. Although taking of names to be board members can come from employees and employers organisations, qualification and competency should be considered. This will give a push to the organisation to employ occupational health and safety practioner who will deal with the issues even in Labour unions. Chartered practioner are the only ones to be appointed as technical committee members. Although we have a technical committee named ZIOSHC it is difficult to trace where it originated in the parent act of NSSA Act 17; 04 of 1990. This leads to inefficiency in the execution of duties prescribed to the committee as it is lacking a clear legal backing. Issues of its competence and relevance being questioned even though its present is crucial in the management of Occupational Health and Safety at National level.

Parent act and its regulations should have a relationship where one can trace from the parent act were the regulation is emanating from. This can be increase coherence and cohesion of laws avoiding conflicting issues for example Environmental Management Act 20:27 have clear relationships with its statutory instruments. However most of occupational health and safety law NSSA Act 17:04 does not have such a relationship with NSSA (Accident Prevention and Workers Compensation Scheme) SI 68 of 1990. 

There is need to call upon Standard Association of Zimbabwe (SAZ) in our occupational health and safety laws for formulation of standards which enforceable. SAZ will therefore be a board which prepares legally binding procedures and standards which will be used in Occupational health and safety monitoring especially in Industrial Hygiene. These standards should be referenced in the laws so as to avoid confusion and updated regularly. In the process of formulation of standards a tripartite approach will be used to ensure that the standards are considering current issues in the country which are economic and professionally sound to avoid adopting other nation’s standards without scrutinizing them. 

Consultant companies in occupational health and safety should be registered with NSSA. Registration process should take into consideration of qualifications of the members of the consultant which are given a proof of expertise to be allowed to consult in that given area which is different from the competence certificate obtained initially. There is need for issuing of identification number to all consultants so that they might be responsible for their work for a client by the national authorities. 

Appointment of safety representatives are covered in the 3rd schedule of SI 68 (Accident prevention and compensation scheme) of 1990. This is done to encourage social dialogue in the country so as to foster a hazard free environment at workplaces. However according to the survey conducted by NSSA 2012, conclusions were drawn requesting the establishment of a law which shows the establishment of ZIOCSH, safety representatives, safety committees at workplace. Appointment of these social dialogue systems should be legally binding (NSSA 2012).This will enable development of strong social dialogue pertaining occupational health and safety in safety (Alli 2008).

It has been recognized, in countries with good safety records, that it is more effective to stipulate the duties of those with primary responsibility for OSH measures in general terms, rather than to attempt to regulate a multitude of hazards in minute detail (Alli 2008). This approach is important because technology is developing at an increasingly rapid pace, and it often proves difficult for the legislation to keep abreast of progress. More recent legislation has therefore avoided setting out detailed requirements, but rather has defined general objectives in broad terms.