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Tomorrow Zimbabwe joins the rest of the world in commemorating Workers Day and it does it in the face of a myriad challenges facing the worker, the growing informalisation of labour and not least a year after the infamous job sackings of 2015. On the other hand, low-end employees are earning little while executives are more than ever taking home world-beating salaries. But there are also things to celebrate, says Kennias Shamuyarira (KS), president of the Zimbabwe Federation of Trade Unions. He talks to The Herald’s Political Editor Tichaona Zindoga (TZ) about May Day and the general condition of the worker.

TZ: We are celebrating Workers’ Day tomorrow, what would you say is the context in which Zimbabwean workers are celebrating May Day this year?
KS: Thank you very much. I think you realise that Workers’ Day is an internationally recognised holiday. It started in Russia on the basis of the socialist revolution whereby the workers in Russia and the peasants were revolting against the Tsarist regime.

So from there on the workers and peasants managed to upstage that Tsarist regime which was premised on profiteering and on racketeering workers. From there on a movement was passed on throughout the globe and they ended up assisting liberation movements. You can see that from the Great October Socialist Revolution the historical narrative continued to be underpinned by trying to repel social injustice that prevailed in the country and world over.

It was also to try and make sure that there was equitable distribution of wealth and of income. So we in Zimbabwe we are also proud to be part of that epic event and as ZFTU, being the largest labour centre in Zimbabwe at present, we are joining hands with the rest of the world in celebrating May Day.

We have got two major successes which we want to celebrate. The first one is that through the attainment of Independence we managed to see workers being uplifted from Master and Servant Act to the present labour relations which have been amended several times. The Government also sponsored the COPAC, constitution-making process where workers were invited to take part.

We took part and managed to have some successes in the form of enshrining the rights to bargain, the rights to strike and the rights to sue the employer for loss of wages or for loss of income. It is now a constitutional right, which is a milestone in the history of workers the world over.

What it translates to, it also means that even a person employed by the Government can actually take the Government to court for not paying him or her. You can sue a parastatal for not paying and you can actually strike for your voice to be heard and you must be heard.

So these are things to celebrate in the context of Zimbabwe and surely there is a lot to be done. With this yardstick we have got a foundation, a step to stand on and pursue further refinement of benefits we seek to achieve as workers.

I think in this context we also want to celebrate the economic policies that have been enunciated by the current Government, for instance the Zim-Asset. It is a very good economic roadmap in that there is a big stake for the workers in the economic empowerment and indigenisation policy.

This is why our May Day theme for this year at ZFTU is “Workers under siege: Rise up and accelerate the employee share ownership dividends through indigenisation and economic empowerment policy”.

What we mean by that is that the Government has set an economic blueprint. Government cannot come and give us things on a silver platter. We will use the same policies that Government has enunciated to claim our space. We will only claim our space as workers through indigenisation and economic empowerment.

How will we do it? It is high time now that workers must take part in management decisions. Workers must take space in shareholding positions. Workers must take space in decisions of economic adventures in each and every undertaking, be it parastatals or private sector. We must also be involved in how we distribute the generated income.

If we are to declare profits, how much is going to enhance the company and how much is going to enhance the social fabric of the workers and our citizens? So we have got a policy and as workers we need to celebrate it.

Right now we have got the National Social Security Authority. It is a thing that was brought to us by the Government and we as workers are stockholders to that Tripartite Alliance institution. In NSSA we now expect to see the workers who go to retirement getting a meaningful pension remittance. We are going further to ask for the National Social Health Scheme.

One thing that is hampering workers is the issue of health. There are so many public hospitals in Zimbabwe but they are not performing. Private hospitals are operating but at exorbitant fees that ordinary workers cannot afford to send their relatives or themselves to be cured. We already have NSSA, where we have got a stake and we must now pursue the setting up of the National Social Health Services.

These are some of the things that we feel we will also be celebrating. On the sad note, we are undergoing a revolution and in any revolution there are casualties and there are hiccups but we need to perfect, we need to soldier on. The skewed income distribution is a major cancer and a major issue of concern that we don’t have to leave it to the Government alone.

It is high time that we the workers assist the Government in tripartite negotiating forums. What do we mean by this? Companies are continuing to go down drastically. It is not because there are no raw materials or a lack of skilled labour or no markets; no, everything is there. We now have enterprises being run by inefficient people, greedy predators who are self-centred, unpatriotic and don’t care about anybody.

For instance, go to National Railways of Zimbabwe, a parastatal. You can’t tell me that NRZ can fail to pay because there are no jobs (to do). There are a lot. Firstly, in Bulawayo there is a cement plant which is functioning at full throttle. You go to Gweru there is a new cement plant. You come to Harare they are there, too. All these are crying for NRZ to carry.

Why is it that when people want to buy cement they have to send lorries which are causing accidents on our roads yet the NRZ has got wagons and nothing is happening? It is because we have CEOs in those parastatals who are not innovative and do not have an aggressive stance on looking for new markets.

If you come to the private sector, all these companies that have dwindled and continue dwindling is because they are unable to keep up with the changing times. Those people who are managing these things, all they are interested in is to see that they continue to get their salaries and their other extra allowances. This cancer is not only limited to the Government.

As workers now we must be involved in the selection of who manages us at Olivine, who manages us at ZESA, who manages us at Air Zimbabwe and so on; it is up to us. We have all the requisite skills. We can’t continue to have aircraft engineers, very skilled and competent, who fly away and are employed in Dubai and elsewhere yet our Airzim is dwindling and almost grounded.

Why? It is because we have a CEO who is not even knowledgeable or innovative or diversified in his thinking. He is self-centred and he only wants to please his masters and himself. This is why you see that there is skewed income distribution. The CEO will be getting $46 000 and the majority of the workers are between $150 and $400.

What does that mean to an economy like Zimbabwe? It means you are even hampering the success of the expansion of the supply and demand chain of products that should be coming from the industrial domain.

A person who is earning $46 000 and has got a family of five, on average can only buy three loaves of bread. And yet you have Lobels here, for instance, who can produce 30 000 loaves a day only to find that out of the 30 000 loaves a day only 6 000 loaves are bought and the rest unsold because there are no people with income to buy. It is only in Zimbabwe where you will find the lowest paid person getting far below the Poverty Datum Line and the highest paid person getting above the apex of First World countries.

TZ: Ok, but these celebrations are also coming against the backdrop of the annus horribilis of job sackings. We have also seen the growing informalisation of labour. How relevant are labour centres now?
KS: That is another thing which we need to celebrate – the July 17 Supreme Court ruling which gave us so many casualties. Approximately 20 000 workers lost employment when employers began to use the Supreme Court ruling to fire the workers using three months notice without going through the normal retrenchment processes.

We as labour centres managed to converge and convince the Government to stop that unnecessary procedure and the Government responded positively by bringing up Amendment No. 5. It stopped all that madness and the employers were redirected to follow retrenchment procedures. Those who fell casualties are to be paid in retrospect.

So it’s a very good move and we must continue to buttress on it. And mind you right now as labour centres we are already working on the finalisation of the revised labour law reforms. So that again is a thing that we need to celebrate because that wrath that has befallen on us has been put to a stop. Although the employers are still crying foul, it is their own business.

TZ: But there are lots of people that are out of formal jobs and are in the informal sector. If the rate of the formally unemployed is so high, how relevant then are you as labour unions?
KS: Labour centres are not only for formal employment, in informal employment there are workers, even ministers they are workers. What we need to do as a stockholder is to realign ourselves with the thrust of making sure that our economic status comes to its footing through pursuing favourable economic policies that are enunciated by the Government. Workers in the informal sector are also part of us. But there is need to mainstream them so that whatever they are getting, it also goes to the national fiscus.

TZ: But have you taken aboard the informal labour? Surely, there are a lot of issues regulatory and structural they face?
KS: The Government is the sole regulatory authority so we are still waiting for them to complete all their stages of formalising the informal sector to make sure that they are sheltered in one house.

Once that is done then labour comes in to assist in the way to do business. They must be told that they must subscribe to NSSA and they must pay tax, so that Government continues to revolve around us. I think you have seen the kombi drivers are in the process of registering a union and that union is basically an affiliate of ZFCTU. We crafted the constitution for them so that they are organised. We do not want workers who are directionless. So we are working along those lines.

TZ: You mentioned earlier that the Government is the biggest employer but as you have seen, Government has frozen recruitment especially for nursing posts at a time there are many graduates from schools. What is your view of the job freeze that Government has imposed?
S.K: This is where I talked of the issue of putting in inefficient people in positions at the wrong time. It is the same when we talk of managers who are bad in the private and public sectors. We have ministers who are useless and redundant who are good at feeding His Excellency with wrong information for their own benefit.

The real reason why Government is doing this is not because there are too many nurses. In fact, they are in demand, but money is being mismanaged due to corruption. A lot of underhand deals are being done by Government ministers and permanent secretaries and at the end of the day the Government remains bankrupt.

So where we need to hit the nail on the head is to curb corruption. (Sack) all those incompetent ministers; they must be taken away and even reduce ministries. We need hardworking ministers who are in touch with the reality on the ground. A minister who is very competent, who has got prompt precision, who is resilient, very revolutionary, must be able to move in his individual capacity and make initiatives.

President Mugabe in his wisdom tries by all means to make major deals wherever he goes. But when he makes mega deals, it is left to the ministers but they are not doing anything. So we need now to see Government workers, who are experienced, very patriotic to call for the sacking of incompetent ministers because they work for them day in and day out, in order for us to protect our nation.

T.Z: Lastly, the country is facing a liquidity crisis as we speak and it could as well be a bleak May Day as workers are going to this holiday with limited cash. How do you think this situation can be remedied so that the country is flush with cash?
KS: As far as we are concerned money is there in Zimbabwe. However, there is a certain elite group that has volumes of money.

Those are the people that you hear that so-and-so has done this; where are you getting the money when there is liquidity crunch? So we need now to take stock of all these people, those super churches that are making millions of money.

All these investors that are coming in, are they banking their money? We need to take stock of that. With all these youngsters who are coming up; those fly-by-night millionaires, where are you getting your money? Are you paying your taxes? Once we go back to the issue of income distribution and if we fix that all these other issues will be a thing of the past.