Public servants in Swaziland say they want a minimum
70 percent pay increase and they are prepared to take to the streets to achieve
it.
Public servants have been at loggerheads with the
Swazi Government for years over pay and conditions. Many international groups
such as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) say Swaziland already devotes too
much of its overall public spending to public servant salaries.
In 2016, the Voice of America
reported public
sector workers in Swaziland had called for increased pay for the past 10 years.
The government had often said the global economic downturn had made it
difficult to meet these demands.
In 2016, public servants received a 17 percent
increase. Members of Parliament got a 32 percent increase in salaries.
The Times of Swaziland, Swaziland’s only
independent daily newspaper, reported on Tuesday (3 January 2017) that Aubrey Sibiya, President of the
National Public Service and Allied Workers Union (NAPSAWU), said the demand would
be achieved by hook or crook.
The Times reported, ‘Sibiya noted that
unionists were ready and prepared to leave their workstations and fill up the
streets in demand of what they believe is theirs. He further said civil
servants’ remuneration in the country was pathetic as compared to other
countries in the region.’
Sibiya
reportedly said if civil servants did not get better pay, ‘the poor will live
miserably while the rich do the opposite’.
In
September 2016, the Times reported
that the Swazi Government had been exposed making ‘empty promises’ to the IMF
that it would control public spending. The Government, which is hand-picked by
King Mswati III, who rules Swaziland as sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute
monarch, had promised only to increase public sector salaries in line with the
cost of living. Instead salaries rose 17 percent adding an estimated E300
million (US$22.14 million) to government spending.
No comments:
Post a Comment