Aljazeera, HR firm lock horns over Nairobi office jobs

What you need to know:

  • Manpower Services (K) Limited has sued Aljazeera for non-payment of recruitment fee amounting to Sh8.6 million for the four senior managers the firm recruited for Aljazeera in 2011.
  • The managers were to man the Al Jazeera Kiswahili regional office in Nairobi which was to broadcast in the five East African Community Partner states.

Aljazeera Satellite Network has fallen out with a local HR consultancy over the hiring of top executives for its Nairobi office.

Manpower Services (K) Limited has sued the Doha-based multinational news channel for non-payment of recruitment fee amounting to Sh8.6 million ($100,000) for the four senior managers the firm recruited for Aljazeera in 2011.

The managers were to man the Al Jazeera Kiswahili regional office in Nairobi which was to broadcast in the five East African Community Partner states: Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda and Burundi.

“Despite the demand made and notice of intention to sue having been given, the defendant (Aljazeera) has refused, failed and/or neglected to pay the said sum of US dollars 100,000 plus VAT,” says Manpower in court documents.

“The defendant recruited two out of six managers ordered, and failed to employ the other four and cancelled the Nairobi project for which the defendant needed six managers,” says Francis Muhindi, Man Power’s managing director in court document.

The consultancy firm reckons that Aljazeera has failed to settle the fees for the search. The four positions are managing director who was to earn a monthly salary of $40,000 (Sh3.44 million) and director of technology, HR manager and manager online who all were to take home a monthly pay of $20,000 (Sh1.72 million).

Aljazeera was to pay an equivalent of a monthly salary of the hired worker plus VAT to Manpower as the recruitment fee, court documents show.

Manpower was tapped by Aljazeera in July 2011 to recruit six senior managers, after which it allegedly advertised and conducted interviews in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.
Manpower says it forwarded a shortlist to Aljazeera, which filled two positions not revealed in court papers.

Al Jazeera’s pursuit of a Nairobi base emerged when Chinese stations like China Central Television (CCTV), were also establishing a presence in East Africa. Al Jazeera was expected to set up its regional corporate office as well as studios, news rooms and broadcast in Kenya.

The establishment of Al Jazeera Kiswahili would have increased the number of the Qatar State-owned broadcaster’s networks, which include English and Arabic channels.
In August it announced the launch of a new TV news channel in the US.

The Chinese national broadcaster CCTV recruited locally as part of its strategy to become a global media network with increased international influence.

The broadcast house currently operates six international channels in six languages: Chinese, English, French, Spanish, Russian and Arabic.

China’s central government has reportedly allocated $7.2 billion (Sh619 billion) to fund the global expansion of State media.

This article first appeared on Businessdailyafrica.com