PSUS ALSO WANT JUNIOR OFFICERS’ 4% SALARY CUSHION

MANZINI – Public sector unions (PSUs) want the four per cent salary cushion meant for junior members of the State security organs.

In fact, according to the leaders of the PSUs, they have formally raised their concerns over government’s offer to junior members of the State security organ in one of their negotiations - Joint Negotiation Forum (JNF). Unions under the banner of PSUs are; the Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT), National Public Service and Allied Workers Union (NAPSAWU), Swaziland Democratic Nurses Union (SWADNU) and Swaziland National Association of Government Accounting Personnel (SNAGAP). SNAT Secretary General (SG) Lot Vilakati said after learning that government, through the Ministry of Public Service, had offered junior members of the country’s three security forces; Umbutfo Eswatini Defence Force (UEDF), Royal Eswatini Police Service (REPS) and His Majesty’s Correctional Services (HMCS), four per cent pay rise to cushion them, they raised their concerns at the JNF.  In the offer, government said the four per cent pay rise would be backdated to April 1, 2022, but the actual implementation would be done in January 2023.

The SG of the teachers’ union said when they lowered their 2022/23 cost-of-living adjustment (CoLA) demand from about seven per cent to at least four per cent, government insisted on three per cent plus a once-off payment of one per cent of their annual salary. He said they asked how come it had offered the junior members of the State security organs four per cent after they had also benefitted from the three per cent CoLA plus the once-off payment of one per cent of their annual salaries. He said if government decided to give the junior members of the State security organs the four per cent salary cushion; it should award it to the rest of the public sector workers.

Strike

“If government will ignore our demand and consider only awarding the four per cent to junior members of the State security organs, we will close our workplaces and engage in a strike,” Vilakati said. However, he mentioned that they were also of the view that the four per cent offer would mean they would get the seven per cent CoLA, which they were demanding when the negotiations started. He said the three per cent CoLA which government awarded them relatively meant nothing to their salaries. He added that the unfortunate thing was that when they raised the matter at the JNF, they were told that they should find a way of including it on the agenda, until then, it would not be discussed. On the same note, NAPSAWU SG Thulani Hlatshwako said what the knew was that everything they agreed on at the JNF as PSUs; all civil servants, including the members of the State security organs and parliamentarians, benefitted all civil servants. In that regard, he said what government had offered the junior members of the States security organs, should be given to all civil servants.

“We are saying this because as PSUs, we usually lead our members in strike actions when demanding salary adjustments and at times they suffer when government implements the no-work, no-pay principle. However, at the end when a collective agreement is signed, every worker in the civil service benefits,” Hlatshwako said. Therefore, he said if government knew what would be best for it as the employer; it should include all civil servants when submitting the supplementary budget for the four per cent salary cushion. He said this was because failure to do so would mean they would engage in an industrial action, which they believed was something the employer  did not want under the prevailing political climate.

SWADNU SG Mayibongwe Masangane said they believed that as civil servants, they were equal in the eyes of the employer. On top of that, he said the rest of the civil servants were facing the same financial challenges, which were faced by the junior members of the State security organs, thus they deserved the same treatment (four per cent salary cushion). “If government fails to award the four per cent salary cushion to all of us (civil servant), we will surely down our tools and march to the Prime Minister’s (PMs) office, just like the junior police officers and warders and stage a strike action thereafter,” Masangane said. He said as PSUs, they did not need explanations about the matter this time around. He said all they needed was to have their salaries cushioned.

Further, SNAGAP SG Phumzile Masilela confirmed that they had already raised their concerns about the matter at the JNF. She said in as much as government tried to defend it, as unions, they would go all out to challenge it. She said they believed that they worked for one employer and they deserved to be treated the same. She said they would not allow the employer to discriminate against them.

4% not part of collective negotiations – Mabulala

MANZINI – The Minister of Public Service, Mabulala Maseko, says the four per cent salary cushion was reached during bilateral talks, not collective negotiations.

The minister said this after he was contacted following the fact that efforts of getting a comment from the Principal Secretary (PS) in the Ministry of Public Service, Sipho Vilakati, were futile as his mobile phone rang unanswered for the better part of yesterday afternoon. A questionnaire was sent to the PS, but at the time of compiling this report, he had not responded to it.  The minister said the issues that had to do with negotiations were supposed to be addressed by the PS because he sat at the roundtable. However, he said he could highlight that there were collective negotiations which were normally attended to by the PSUs and bilateral meeting.

He said the issue of the four per cent was discussed at a bilateral level, just like nurses who successfully negotiated to be paid overtime allowances.  “It depends on the nature of their work,” the minister added. Therefore, he said the issue of junior police officers was supposed to be addressed in 2014 and the four per cent salary cushion was a result of the demand for the implementation of Phase II of the salary restructuring exercise. He added that the salary review exercise would start from the four per cent when reviewing salaries for the junior officers.

It is worth noting that when tabling the offer to cushion their salaries by increasing them by four per cent, government said the issue of Phase II would be addressed by a consultant, which would be doing a salary review exercise for all civil servants in the country. Again, it is worth highlighting that some of the junior officers in the police service and HMCS rejected the four per cent salary cushion. However, the minister of Public Service said those who did not want the four per cent should leave it in the bank when government implemented the salary cushion in January 2023.

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