Twitter has laid off nearly all of its employees in Ghana, where it had its only African office.The company “is re-organizing its operations as a result of a need to reduce costs.” The layoffs were part of a global staff reduction initiated by new CEO Elon Musk.
The Ghana office opened last year to much fanfare, with the company claiming that it wanted to be more “immersed” in African conversations.An anonymous employee told the BBC that, unlike in some other countries, no redundancy was offered, but that their regular salary would be paid until the end of their contract at the beginning of next month.
After news of mass layoffs broke around the world on November 4, Elon Musk tweeted that employees had been “offered 3 months of severance,” but it was unclear which office he was referring to.
“It’s very insulting,” the anonymous Ghana employee said. Under local law laid-off staff must be paid redundancy and should be given three months notice, as opposed to under a month in the case of the Ghanaian employees who have been told the “last day of employment will be 4 December 2022”.
“From the mail to the lack of next steps to the tone of the letter. Just everything. Ridiculously insulting,” the staff member continued. Ghana staff were sent messages about the end of their contracts to their personal accounts, after being denied access to work emails.
There were just under 20 people employed in Ghana’s Twitter office who were working in various roles from curation and marketing to editorial, the BBC understands. The letter from Twitter’s management further warned staff not to “contact or deal with any customers, clients, authorities, banks, suppliers or other employees of the Company and are required to inform the Company if contacted”.
It also told staff not to commence any other employment or engagement until their last day with the organisation, while wishing them the very best in their future endeavours. Mr Musk, Twitter’s new owner, has been laying off staff worldwide. He said he had “no choice” but to slash the company’s workforce as the firm was losing more than $4m (£3.5m) a day.
Last year, Twitter announced it was opening its first Africa office in Ghana in a bid to “be more immersed in the rich and vibrant communities that drive the conversations taking place every day across the African continent”, it said in an April 2021 statement.
At the time, Twitter had praised Ghana for “free speech, online freedom, and the Open Internet” with the news even being welcomed by Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo who described it as “excellent”.
