Kenya Commercial Bank(KCB) has been ordered to pay Sh 1.7 Million to a former employee who was forced to resign after the bank mishandled her sexual harassment complaint against her supervisor.
Employment court judge Linnet Ndolo awarded the woman Sh 1.7 Million after she won her case of constructive dismissal agasint the bank.
In the case, the woman M.E through her lawyer Paul Macharia Muchiri sued the bank claiming she resigned due to pressure from her bosses after she reported her immediate supervisor accusing him of sexual harassment.
She claimed unlawful termination, sexual harassment and discrimination at her workplace.
Justice Ndolo ruled in her favour saying from the case, the employee’s complaint was ignored at every turn and in the end she was turned into a villain and forced out of employment.
“Therefore, I have no difficulty in reaching the conclusion that her resignation was not voluntary. What is more even after she changed her mind and sought to recall the resignation, the bank shut that door as well,” the judge ruled.
The court also ruled that it had evaluated the actions taken by the bank with regard to the claimants case and reached the unavoidable conclusion that there was a well calculated move by the bank officials to obscure the claimants complaint of sexual harassment.
“I find and hold that the claimant has proved a case of constructive dismissal as defined in law,” the court ruled.
She went ahead to award her 12 months salary compensation saying that in arriving at this award, it had taken into account her length of service and how the bank mishandled her sexual harassment complaint by failing to investigate her supervisor who was accused of sexually harassing her.
In her case, the employee who was a teller at the bank said she was employed at the bank in 2009 and at the time of leaving her employment she earned Sh 133,000 per month.
Through lawyer Muchiri, she told court that she suffered social stress occasioned by acts of the bank officers including sexual harassment by her supervisor, bullying and coercion which caused her to write a one sentence letter in May 2019 intimating her intention to resign.
She claims that her supervisor caressed and touched her thighs, uttered emotionally offensive and suggestive words, demanded sex from her, humiliated her with his advances and subjected her to internal memos.
The cash manager who was her immediate boss is alleged to have called and texted her outside working hours with threats that she either gives in to his sexual demands or he gets his way with her.
He is even alleged to have embarrassed her in front of their customers on many occasions.
The bank in their defence said she voluntarily resigned from her position and they accepted it thereby declining her decision to rescind the resignation.
The bank denied the sexual harassment claims saying it was only a diversionary tactic to avoid culpability for her act of insubordination.
The court also dismissed the bank’s counterclaim and also the supervisor’s case where he sought for the woman to be ordered to publish apology for wrongly accusing him.
