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Mr Ngoni Masoka

Herald Reporter
Civil servants could know how much they will get in salary increments today as the much-awaited negotiations with Government start.
The workers’ representatives want the least-paid Government employee to earn a salary at par with the poverty datum line, which the Consumer Council of Zimbabwe pegs at about US$540.

Civil servants also want 30 percent of their basic salary as a rural allowance to cushion those working outside urban centres.
Currently, the least-paid Government worker is getting US$297.

President Mugabe has expressed his Government’s commitment to pay workers a wage linked to the PDL. Presenting his 2014 National Budget proposals to Parliament last week, Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa reiterated this position, though he said adjustments would be incremental until they meet the PDL by December next year.

Yesterday, the Secretary for Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare Mr Ngoni Masoka said: “I can confirm that there is a meeting between Government and civil servants’ representatives at 10am tomorrow (today).”

Today’s meeting will be the first between the Government and the Apex Council, an umbrella body representing civil servants’ unions, since the inauguration of the Zanu-PF Government after the July 31, 2013 harmonised election landslide victory.

The talks were supposed to have been held months back, but were stalled by workers as they could not agree on nine representatives to the National Joint Negotiating Council, a salary discussion forum between Government and civil servants.

Civil servants did not benefit from any real changes to their conditions of service throughout the duration of the inclusive Government from 2009 to 2013, as the Finance and Public Service ministries — both under MDC-T ministers — repeatedly said the State was in no position to improve their welfare.

The ZANU-PF Government has said it will work on both monetary and non-monetary incentives for workers. Apex Council alternate chairpersons Mr Richard Gundane and Mrs Cecilia Alexander yesterday said they were eager to start the talks in which they have placed their faith to bring joy to under paid civil servants.

“Now that the budget has been presented, we are going to the meeting to see how much Government is allocating to civil servants’ salaries,” said Mr Gundane. “Obviously, our demand going to the meeting is a salary increment in line with the PDL. We want to see how far Government can go.”

Mrs Alexander added: “This will be a formal engagement with Government. We expect them to bring an offer that is reasonable.
“We are also happy and appreciative of the fact that Government has shown commitment to increasing civil servants’ salaries even though they said it will be gradual until December.

“It is our hope that the biggest chunk of that increment will be paid in the first quarter of the year. We hope the negotiations will be done in such a way that civil servants will get the increment by January.”

Government workers, said Mrs Alexander, were alive to the fact that the country faced economic challenges, hence the Government could not afford to increase salaries to PDL levels at one go.

Out of the nine seats in the Apex Council, the education sector – which constitutes the bulk of the country’s civil servants – has five representative.

The Zimbabwe Teachers Association has two seats and their president will be the Apex Council alternate chairperson; the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe and the College Lecturers Association of Zimbabwe have one seat each.

The Public Service Association has two seats, while the other have been allocated to the Professional and Technical Officers Association and the Civil Service Employees Association of Zimbabwe.