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UNI Global Union questions DHL CEO’s credibility



UNI Global Union says that the credibility of the CEO of Deutsche Post DHL, Frank Appel, is in doubt after the Annual General Shareholders meeting held in Frankfurt 25 May, and his responses to searching questions from UNI and ITF and interventions from shareholders who were concerned with the company’s employment policies.



Following a protest outside the hall where the AGM was being held, staged by UNI and ITF, where they highlighted the ongoing violation of workers rights and human rights by Deutsche Post DHL throughout the world. UNI and ITF have been seeking to negotiate a global agreement with Deutsche Post DHL to regulate these practises but to date the company has refused to agree to such a measure.



The protest highlighted one of the violations of human rights carried out by DHL where they subject their workers to lie detector tests. Workers have been sacked for their responses to this notoriously unreliable test and at the protest shareholders were shown how this intimidating and illegal practice is carried out. Shareholders were also provided with a dossier of workers rights abuses that DHL have undertaken. During the AGM several shareholders referred to this dossier and many questioned the CEO on what they described as clearly unsatisfactory labour relations in DHL.



Inside the AGM, UNI and ITF speakers raised the issue of lie detectors, especially the case of Edwin Velasquez Ayala from Colombia, who had been sacked after a lie detector test of all staff at a Bogota DHL site concerning a minor theft. The theft had never been properly investigated and Edwin had never been given the opportunity to question these totally unfounded allegations or to find out why he had been sacked or why he had supposedly ”failed” this test. During the lie detector test he had been subject to totally offensive and unacceptable questioning including about his family, their activities, their relationships and questioning whether they might be criminals!



The company was also questioned about their anti union actions in India where they are refusing to implement an agreed collective agreement and in other countries where they refuse to recognise the union and where if the company finds workers are union activists they are in fear of losing their job. UNI and ITF said negotiating a global agreement would put in place a mechanism for resolving these issues. Mr Appel’s response was that DHL did not see the need for such an agreement. He said Deutsche Post DHL have signed the UN Global Compact and that they respect ILO Core labour standards, a claim that was disputed several times by UNI and ITF. Violations of both those codes are detailed in UNI and ITF’s dossier referred to by several shareholders.



UNI and ITF said they were concerned about the credibility of the CEO's answers as at the AGM last year Mr Appel had made a categorical statement to shareholders that he would not condone the use of lie detectors, but there was clear evidence that this practice was continuing with the testimony in Frankfurt of Edwin Velasquez Ayala. In response Mr Appel stunned the AGM by changing his statement from 2010 by saying that it was Deutsche Post DHL’s policy to use lie detectors, a policy which he went on to detail.



In response to other questions about the veracity of his answers to questions at previous AGM’s, UNI Global Union was also dissatisfied that originally he had not told the truth. “Perhaps Mr Appel should be the one on the lie detector, especially when answering UNI Global Unions questions at AGM’s? Can we believe what he tells us as shareholders?”, said Neil Anderson Head of UNI Post & Logistics Global Union.