The court ruled that the claimant was an independent contractor and not an employee of the company, thus unable to claim protections under the Industrial Relations Act.

The Reference

[1] This is a reference dated 21 February 2020 by the Honourable Minister of Human Resources pursuant to s 20(3) of the Industrial Relations Act 1967 ("The Act") arising out of the alleged dismissal of FAREEN SHAZLI BIN ALI ("Claimant") by KEBABANGAN PETROLEUM OPERATING COMPANY SDN BHD ("Company") on the 18 October 2019.

[2] Pursuant to the directions of this Court, the parties in this matter filed their respective submissions accordingly. This Court received the following written submissions of the parties namely the Claimant's written submissions dated 30 June 2023, the Company's written submissions dated 30 June 2023, the Claimant's written submissions in reply dated 13 July 2023 and the Company's written submissions in reply 13 July 2023.

[3] This Court considered all the notes of proceedings in this matter, documents and the cause papers in handing down this Award namely:

(i) The Claimant's Statement of Case dated 23 July 2020 with the Annexures therein;

(ii) The Company's Statement in Reply dated 10 August 2020;

(iii) The Claimant's Rejoinder dated 25 August 2020;

(iv) The Claimant's Bundle of Documents - CLB1, CLB2 & CLB3;

(v) The Company's Bundles of Documents - COB1, COB2, COB3 & COB4;

(vi) The Claimant's Witness Statement - CLW - WS;

(vii) Company's Witness Statement - COW1-WS (Miss Sangheetha a/p Jaganathan);

(viii) Company's Witness Statement - COW2 - WS (Encik Ahmad Kamal Bin Samsuddin);

Introduction

[4] The dispute before this Court is the claim by Fareen Shazli Bin Ali ("the Claimant") that he was dismissed from his employment without just cause or excuse by Kebabangan Petroleum Operating Company Sdn Bhd ("the Company") on the 18 October 2019.

[5] The Company is involved in the oil and gas industry wherein the Company is responsible for the exploration, development and production of natural gas resources from the Kebabagan Cluster fields located at the coast of Kota KInablau, Sabah. The Company entered into a contract with a third-party known as Carimin Sdn Bhd (Carimin) for the provision of general and specialist manpower services for the Company wherein Carimin is to provide individuals as contractors to perform certain functions for the Company.

[6] The Claimant, a Senior Executive for Business Assurance was one of the individuals provided by Carimin for the Company for certain selected functions and the Claimant was emplaced in the Company for this purpose. The Claimant's duties at the Company work site include tasks such as to monitor overall business efficiency and compliance to internal process and procedures. It was the Company's contention that the Company discovered the Claimant's performance in the discharge of his duties were below expectations and the same was communicated to the Claimant but despite efforts of the Company to assist the Claimant to improve, the Claimant displayed lack of interest and his performance continued to deteriorate. The Company states that in view of the Claimant's inability to meet the expectation of a Senior Executive in his role, the Company ceased his emplacement in the Company on the 11 September 2019. The Company at all times deny that the Claimant was an employee of the Company and maintains that he was an independent contractor under a contract for services with Carimin and who was emplaced at the Company to provide his services.

[7] The Claimant however contends that the Company herein is the true and real employer of the Claimant in view of the degree of control the Company has exercised over him. The Claimant denies