CIVIL servants held their breath yesterday as executive members of various public sector unions (PSUs) engaged in a meeting with the government negotiations team that lasted over seven hours.
The meeting, held at the ministry of public service, commenced at about 2pm, and by 9pm, the PSUs executive had not updated civil servants of the outcome of the discussions held under the joint negotiation forum (JNF) banner.
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On Wednesday evening the PSUs’ executives, when giving an update of the day’s outcome of discussions, said government had informed them that E1.29 billion had been raised towards the implementation of the salary review.
The E1.29 billion was an improvement from the E500 million that government had earlier announced to have set aside for the salary review. With the E500 million, which was less than the E1.643 billion recommended by the consultant, government had hinted on a phased implementation over two financial years, which civil servants rejected.
Speaking on behalf of the PSUs, Swaziland National Association of Teachers (SNAT) President Mbongwa Dlamini said the GNT requested to pay the civil servants 64% of the amount that had been recommended by the consultant, and then settle the balance in the first week of July next year.
However, the workers rejected this and demanded full implementation of the salary review. Dlamini also informed the civil servants that government had requested to pay their allowances in phases, which the civil servants also rejected.
On another note, Dlamini said for civil servants paid under Grades A and B, whom the consultant reportedly felt would not be affected by the review, government had offered to pay them a 3% ounce-off payment, which the PSUs rejected. Dlamini said government then raised the offer to 5%.
The PSUs’ request was that civil servants whose pay Grades are As and Bs, their housing allowances should be paid in full rather than in phases as per government’s request.
Before yesterday afternoon’s meeting, the PSUs executives had a joint general council meeting at the SNAT centre in Manzini where it was agreed that civil servants wanted the review to be implemented in full, or a notch-to-notch implementation, meaning workers should be paid according to their experience.
This was part of the agenda at the JNF.
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