City of Harare workers getting a raw deal

Cosmas Bungu Correspondent
It is disturbing and devastating to hear that City of Harare has a salary backlog of five months. The City of Harare is one of the biggest employers in the country and it becomes a huge issue when it clearly does not consider its workers as one of its fundamental priorities.

Without pay, service delivery deteriorates or is shattered totally. Harare City is now a shambles because of the failure by the employer to prioritise important things, i.e. payment of salaries, roads maintenance and reviving the crusher station which in turn generates money to alleviate council problems, like refuse collections and maintenance of parks.

It is sad that we are dealing with people and an employer who does not have a vision for a better future for the good of our city and the employees. Council continues to make bad decisions in the road to achieving Vision 2025.

City of Harare has made the abnormal look normal, and we wonder what sort of employer does that to his poor and hardworking employees and still feels comfortable with it. Children are being sent home for non-payment of fees, families being evicted from their lodgings because they cannot afford to settle their monthly rentals as their sources of income are somehow frozen by an employer who does not have his employees at heart.

To put matters into perspective, the workers’ grievances emanate from an informed position with regards to the financial position of the employer. To give a clear picture of everything, the following factors have to be put into consideration. The City of Harare collects around $15 to $16 million every month from money paid through rentals, rates, water, service charges, businesses and council properties.

Of this money, the correct position is that 40 percent has to be set aside for salaries of the council workforce and the remainder to service delivery. That translates to $6,4 million for salaries and $9,6 million for service delivery and other requirements, as highlighted above but alas workers have not been paid for five months. This is no longer about capacity but clear disregard for the workers’ rights. On the other hand, service delivery continues to decline due to the city ignoring the workers’ proposals on service delivery enhancement.

There are also more earnings to the City of Harare from other sources like ZINARA which remits $100 000- $200 000 each month. What infuriates the employees more is that neither salaries nor service delivery is being prioritised, leaving a big question on the administration of council funds, an area in itself shrouded in deep mystery.

We have continued to make a passionate plea for transparency on the part of council to its stakeholders. We have suggested ways to plug revenue leakages and ensure efficiency, a move which guarantees improved service delivery and payment of workers’ salaries.

As expected these calls have fallen on deaf ears of a stubborn system that is working to undermine the efforts of the employees in restoring the pride and image of our beloved city.

Again the question is, why resist progressive ideas when it is clear the current situation is not sustainable?

What has been happening and continues to happen is that instead of setting aside 40 percent for salaries, only 10 percent is being put aside, a percentage way off the mark whose only end result has always been a salary backlog.

If service delivery and workers’ salaries are not a priority to the employer, then the question is where is the money going? Roads are in a bad state, garbage is sometimes not collected, some suburbs have given up hope of having running water among a myriad challenges facing the city.

Surely, after toiling for the whole month, it’s only logical to be paid what was agreed in our contracts.

Ours is not a position informed by nagging the employer for the sake of it but a call for the employer to be humane enough to honour obligations.

Our families have suffered for so long and enough is enough.

In light of all these challenges, the workers’ body has been in constant discussion on the need to give notice for industrial action as discussed by the workers’ unions, which action will culminate in the mother of all strikes. Workers have suffered enough at the hands of a council management that lacks sincerity.

It is important for all stakeholders to have clarity of vision, that we are dealing with a system far removed from the suffering of its key populations. Our hope is that the information contained in this article will open the gates for more questions to be asked and answers be found.

Despite the employer not giving employees their salaries for five months, workers are expected to come to work every day. Registers are marked and those absent are called for a hearing or are dismissed. It is mind boggling. Where does the employer think employees are getting the money to commute to and fro everyday without receiving monthly payments?

Whilst the employees are starving and facing real life difficulties, the council is busy allocating sectors that generate income to outside companies. We begin to wonder whether those who lead the council are here to build it or bring it to the ground.

It is surprising that City of Harare actually engaged a local company to manage commuter omnibuses and billboards advertisements claiming that this would, in fact, avoid leakages. How can this avoid leakages? Where is the transparency in this allocation, and how do we know that all the money that is generated from billboards and commuter omnibus goes straight into council coffers and these companies are there to maximise profit?

Council has a department which deals with issues such as billboards and commuter omnibus, so why give this responsibility to an outside company, i.e. subcontract when you have qualified and experienced workers to do the work?

City of Harare was once our pride and joy, the “Sunshine City”, but it has been reduced to being a capital city of potholes and doleful service delivery.

Residents have nothing to be proud of, as the city has deteriorated due to poor allocation of funds and non-payment of salaries to employees that are expected to keep Harare clean and admirable to and a pride to investors.

Something has to be done and it has to be done quickly to save our city and the workers that are making strides to make sure that the capital returns to its glory days before it is destroyed from left, right and centre.

If nothing is done, our goal to achieve Zim-Asset and the 2025 World Class City remains stuck in the pipeline. We cannot allow this sorry state of affairs to continue.

Our city cannot die while we watch; we call upon authorities to assist on this matter.

Cosmas Bungu is the executive chairman of the Harare Municipal Workers’ Union