Govt, Civil Servants On Collision Course THE ZANU-PF government is on a collision course with its employees as the cash-strapped administration moves to trim its labour force, estimated to number over 250 000. Finance Minister, Patrick Chinamasa, in his budget presentation last month said employment costs had become a problem which could “not continue to be postponed.” Figures from Treasury indicate that nearly 80 percent of revenue generated by the State is directed to civil servants salaries. The retrenchment would therefore be an admission by the powers-that-be that the current wage bill is way beyond what they could afford. Government has on countless occasions been advised to reduce its salary bill but it has always found convenient excuses to justify the heavy recurrent expenditure. The wage bill further ballooned towards the end of last year when government gave in to demands by the civil servants to hike their salaries in line with its election promises. From then on, it became quite clear to everyone that government had bitten off more than it could chew. Revenue collection targets by the taxman, the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (ZIMRA) — the main source of income used to pay civil servants salaries — have been missed for the past two consecutive years, with a strong indication that this year will fare no better, if not worse. ZIMRA recorded a nearly US$30 million budget deficit in the nine months to September last year while revenue collections in the third quarter amounted to US$884,5 million, missing by nine percent the target of US$972,3 million. In 2013, ZIMRA collected a total US$3,4 billion in tax receipts, six percent short of a US$3,6 billion target. The shrinking tax revenue base does not augur well for relations between government and its workers which are already at an all-time low, further strained by the former’s delays in paying out the annual 13th cheque to civil servants. Teachers received their bonuses on Tuesday. Teachers unions last weekend had indicated that they would boycott duty when schools opened for the first term this year over non-payment of their dues if bonus had not come. Teachers unions said delays of this magnitude in paying bonuses had never taken place in the country’s 34-year long independence history and blamed the government for being a dishonest broker in wage negotiations. Sifiso Ndlovu, chief executive of the Zimbabwe Teachers Association said the issue of the bonus had become a bitter pill among the country’s teaching corps. “The employer has not communicated anything to us officially and the anticipation and confusion is high…,” said Ndlovu. Social and political commentator, Zibusiso Dube, said such hiccups in the early start of the New Year were a sign of the discontent and strife in public labour relations that would dominate proceedings this year as workers protest retrenchments and possible cutting of salaries. “…Salaries are taking a large percent of the country’s revenues because the revenues are low to begin with. Civil servants should not bear either the brunt of poor revenue collection or a poor economy. Government should improve revenues and build the economy, instead of transferring the burden of its incompetence to workers. It is also imperative that the issue of ghost workers be addressed,” said Dube. Rashweat Mukundu, a political analyst, however, said the ZANU-PF government was caught up in a Catch 22 situation faced with either retrenching its bloated workforce which made economic sense or run the risk of doing nothing at the expense of political expediency. “Much depends on the political calculations that the ZANU-PF government will make on the risk of retrenching civil servants and appearing insensitive when unemployment is this high and also as the party is essentially focused on 2018,” he said. “The other option is to bite the bullet and cut the civil service and make the government machinery more efficient, build skills of the remaining civil servants and provide a better service. Ultimately it’s a question of either making economic or political decisions, both with consequences of sorts.” — Staff Reporter [email protected]
Posted on: Thu, 08 Jan 2015 15:38:46 +0000
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