National strike this week – these are the services that will be affected
South Africa’s government won’t budge on plans to impose below-inflation wage increases on its workers even as a labour union that represents almost a quarter of a million state employees announced plans to strike, Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana said.
The standoff between civil servants and the government has come to a head after Labor Minister Thulas Nxesi last week said he was unilaterally implementing a 3% wage increase for the state’s 1.3 million workers.
The Public Servants Association said Tuesday that its members will embark on a strike that will affect the activities of government departments, especially home affairs and transport, from 10 November.
Unions have demanded a raise of as much as 10%. Inflation in South Africa is currently 7.5%.
“We have done all we could,” Godongwana said in an interview in Pretoria, the capital, Thursday. “We have got no room to move at the moment, even in the medium-term budget policy statement the carry-through costs we have are only for the 3%.”
State salaries have increased by an annual average of two percentage points above inflation for the past decade, and compensation accounts for almost a third of government expenditure. Limiting further growth in the wage bill is key to government efforts to rein in debt and reduce budget deficits that soared during the Covid-19 pandemic and its related lockdowns.
PSA statement
The Public Servants Association (PSA), representing some 235 000 members in the Public Service with the support of the Federation of Unions of South Africa (Fedusa), will be embarking on a national strike from 10 November 2022.
The strike will have a serious impact on the activities of departments, especially Home Affairs, Transport, and Border Control. This will be the first major Public-Service strike since 2010.
The PSA issued the Union’s strike notice on 24 October 2022 after a deadlock was reached in salary negotiations following the government’s offer of a 3% increase and discontinuation of the cash gratuity after 31 March 2023. The PSA has demanded a revised offer of a 6.5% increase and the continuation of the cash gratuity beyond 31 March 2023.
Public servants, like other employees and taxpayers, are feeling the severe effects of major price increases for fuel, transport, and food, as well as interest rate hikes. The cash gratuity, which is not pensionable and thus not an ultimate solution, assisted public servants and, if retained beyond March 2023, will further assist public servants who have not received a salary increase for the past three years.
The government’s decision to unilaterally implement the meagre increase in public servants’ salaries in November 2022 has angered the PSA, and the Union will intensify its efforts to protect public servants’ rights and interests as underlined by nationwide marches on 10 November 2022.
The unilateral decision by the government will have a serious impact on how negotiations will be conducted in the public sector in future. This irresponsible action has further damaged the already fragile relations and severe trust deficit between the government and unions.
The PSA’s national strike action will be supported by its sister unions affiliated to Fedusa.
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