adminHerald Reporter
Nurses and other health workers at rural district council clinics and hospitals countrywide are in a quandary after their employers and the Government disowned them.
This came out during a long drawn labour case in which hundreds of nurses and other medical staff operating at council clinics were seeking an increase in salaries and payment of salary arrears. The dispute arose when the workers realised that they were now getting far less than what other council employees were getting and they instructed their lawyers to seek an upward review of salaries and benefits in line with the councils’ pay standards.
Lawman Chimuriwo Attorneys instructed Advocate Thabani Mpofu to argue the matter while Warara and Associates are acting for the RDCs.
The councils insisted that since Government was now involvement in the payment of the medical staff, they were now civil servants and that their salaries and benefits had nothing to do with the local authorities.
However, Government, in a letter dated February 16 2010, distanced itself from the dispute saying the workers were still employees of the councils.
Health and Child Care secretary Dr Gerald Gwinji, said the workers in question remained on the salary structures of the rural district councils.
“Pursuant to my Ministry’s circular No 2 referenced 1/1/1 DC277 dated 12 May 2004, may you be advised that the staff under Rural District Councils still remain employees of, and on salary structures, of Rural District Councils.
“The grant support towards their salaries does not make them civil servants,” read the letter.
Three judges of the Labour Court are expected to determine whether or not the workers in question are civil servants.
Online Reporter