Ministers’ pay hike riles civil servants

salaries have been increa-sed by 200 percent, at a time when the Government says it is broke.
The weekly Standard newspaper yesterday reported that ministers had been awarded hefty increments.
Civil service unions responded by criticising the development as selfish.
The salary increase comes at a time when Government workers are earning less than US$200 a month.
Civil service unions’ representatives yesterday said the latest development clearly showed the height of insincerity by the inclusive Government to address their remuneration concerns.
The unions said they were now eagerly waiting to meet President Mugabe to pre-sent their grievances.
Ministers reportedly started getting an average US$2 300 salary in January before deductions and taking home about US$2 000.
It has emerged that the salary increments were effected in January, but the news was kept under wraps until last week when the matter came to light.
The unions felt ministers were not informing the Head of State and Government about their challenges.
In this regard, they feel a meeting with the President is the only solution to end their problems.
Civil service trade unionists first sought a meeting with the President in January after failing to secure meaningful salary increments after meeting Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai, Finance Minister Ten-dai Biti and Public Service Minister Eliphas Mukonoweshuro.
Apex Council chairperson Mrs Tendai Chikoore said the increment for ministers showed that Government had capacity to pay its workers.
She, however, said it was difficult to take any action now until they meet President Mugabe.
“If it is true then it means they have the capacity to pay us. We just hope that this is going to cascade downwards. We can’t do anything at the moment until we have a meeting with the President.
“We are waiting for a date from the Chief Secretary for us to meet the Head of State and Government,” she said.
Zimbabwe Teachers Association chief executive Mr Sifiso Ndlovu urged Government to urgently review civil servants’ salaries.
“We can see the selfishness in our leadership,” said Mr Ndlovu.
Instead of presenting the workers’ pli-ght to the executive, the ministers were busy negotiating their own hefty salary increments, he said as he urged the lea-ders to reconsider the budget in view of increasing salaries.
“Otherwise, they are brewing discontentment that would be very difficult to contain. That is why we are continuously pleading to meet the President. We feel he has not been given sufficient information by our ministers to appreciate the level of our challenges,” said Mr Ndlovu.
Progressive Teacher’s Union of Zimbabwe secretary general Mr Raymond Majongwe said the development would force civil servants to confront Government.
“The dilemma that we are facing is that those who have access to the cookie jar are sharing cookies among themselves.
“It’s unfair to accept such a reality and they are forcing us to confront Govern-ment. These guys should just come smart and explain why they are being insincere. It is very rude for ministers to agree on such a salary without doing the same to their workers,” said Mr Majongwe.
Teachers’ Union of Zimbabwe chief executive Mr Manuel Nyawo added: “That is a shocking development and it shows how selfish this inclusive Government is.”
Mr Nyawo said it was now clear that there was no one representing them in Cabinet to air their grievance.
“It is an awakening call to the civil service unions that it’s time for us to call a spade a spade. Why can’t we go in the streets and demand a similar increment.
“We cannot continue to say the economy is still ailing when ministers in the same Government are awarding themselves such hefty increments.”
President Mugabe in January bemoa-ned civil servants’ poor working conditions. He said civil servants were set to benefit from diamond proceeds.
It is understood that Government had raked in more than US$170 million from diamond sales this year alone.
However, Minister Biti had chosen to play the blame game claiming that Treasury had not received the diamond money.
This is despite confirmation from ZMDC that dividends from diamond sales were being channelled to Treasury.