X, formerly known as Twitter, has finally fulfilled its commitment to the sacked Twitter staff in its African office based in Ghana’s capital, Accra, according to a BBC report.
The staff, numbering around 20, were fired in November 2022 following the change in ownership of social media giant X, then Twitter.
The company underwent a “global cull of employees” as the new boss, Elon Musk, aimed to cut down on expenses.
X has previously said it had paid all the old staff of Twitter.
The staff have been engaging the new management of X for their redundancy money to be paid to them for over a year now. They also threatened to sue the new company.
According to the BBC, the company providing legal representation to the staff, Agency Seven Seven, said, “It had been successful in its quest to get a redundancy settlement and repatriation expenses for foreign staff, although it did not specify the amount of the pay-out.”
“They are very pleased to finally be able to get their due, put this behind them, and look to the future,” Carla Olympio from Agency Seven Seven told the global broadcaster.
Some of the sacked employees reported having suffered mental health and financial issues due to how X treated them.
“It’s difficult when it’s the world’s richest man owing you money and closure,” one opened up to the BBC.
They said they were initially told that, although their contracts were being terminated, they would be paid to work for one more month. But they were immediately locked out of their emails and no further salary payments were made.
This resulted in a constant tassel with X for their compensation
As the Accra office housed staff from neighboring Nigeria and the rest, the contract termination meant they couldn’t return to their home country, leaving them stranded in Ghana’s capital.
In a rare interview last April, Mr Musk told the BBC that the social media giant had 1,500 employees, down from just under 8,000 who were employed at the time he bought the company.
When the news of Mr Musk’s radical staff cull became public, he tweeted that laid-off employees were given three months’ severance pay.
But the staff based in the Africa office say they did not receive this.
According to Agency Seven Seven, X only began negotiations with the sacked African staff after the BBC covered the story.
Last year, X was hit by a lawsuit, filed by ex-employees in a California court, for allegedly refusing to pay at least $500 million in promised severance packages.
The world’s richest man, Elon Musk, took over the company in 2022.
Musk bought Twitter Inc. for $44 billion. Since the takeover, most of Twitter’s staff have been laid off or resigned.
Musk renamed the company X, changed some of its content rules, and lost more than half of its advertising revenue.