REVEALED: NO BUDGET FOR ONCE-OFF PAYMENT

A section of the PSAs General Council members attending a meeting in this file picture.

MANZINI - Can you believe it?

At the height of mounting pressure from public sector associations (PSAs), who were demanding that government offer them a cost-of-living adjustment (CoLA) surpassing three per cent, government did the unthinkable.

It committed itself to a three per cent CoLA and an additional one per cent once-off payment to all civil servants calculated based on their annual pay. However, when this decision was taken, government had only budgeted E227 million for CoLA while the additional once-off payment had not been allocated any funds.

As government had not budgeted for this expenditure, a plan was to be made and this arrangement resulted in government reintroducing the hiring freeze; inclusive of essential services.

Memorandum 

This is substantiated by a memorandum released by the Ministry of Public Service on September 2, 2020. It has been gathered that the core reason government released the memorandum, was because it wanted to suspend any prospects of recruitment into the civil service in order to raise E57 million which became a shortfall after the implementation of the one per cent once-off payment equivalent to each civil servants’ annual remuneration.  

When awarding the three per cent CoLA and the additional one per cent once-off payment, it ended up not being limited to only civil servants, as history repeated itself. 

This is because, just like in the implementation of the public sector workers’ salary review of 2016, politicians benefitted from the pay structure targeting civil servants as they were awarded the three per cent CoLA and the additional once-off payment of one per cent of their annual salary. 

Circulars 

This is despite that politicians have their own pay structure, which is set through circulars. 

Currently, local politicians are paid through Finance Circular No.2 of 2013, as a circular set for the remuneration and perks of the 11th Parliament politicians was suspended. 

This is particularly because government, through the Ministry of Finance, suspended the implementation of Finance Circular No.3 of 2019, whose aim was to be the guiding instrument for the remuneration of politicians of the 11th Parliament.  

Given this challenge government faced, a sacrifice was made and it involved the sidelining of graduates from various tertiary institutions who anticipated to be absorbed into the civil service.

Annually, over 2 000 students graduate from local institutions and seek employment in various sectors, including the civil service. However, those who had wished to join the civil service after completion of their studies will this year have a tough time as the memorandum reintroduced by government states that it will not be waived in the 2020/21 financial calendar. This period lapses on March 31, 2021.  Principal Secretary (PS) in the Ministry of Public Service Sipho Tsabedze confirmed that the hiring freeze sought to also assist government recover the cost of the additional one per cent once-off payment.

The PS said there was no budget for the additional one per cent once-off payment and government’s mission to render vacant posts dormant was aimed at raising funds. He said the cost was calculated to be around E57 million. 

When sought to assist with the actual number of people or posts that would not be filled by government, Tsabedze said: “The posts are not static as they are created on a daily basis. They are a result of natural attrition and also some public service workers leaving the employ of government for greener pastures.”

Leading to this, the Ministry of Public Service was said to be promoting civil servants to higher posts which was bloating the already stuffed wage bill.

Currently, government has about 44 000 employees in the various ministries. 

Promoting 

In recent months, the ministry had been promoting senior human resources officers to be principal human resources officers and other personnel within the civil service. 

By default, the promotion of the former created vacant posts for the latter which in turn demanded recruitment of personnel into the civil service much against the hiring freeze imposed by the 10th Parliament’s Cabinet, led by the late former Prime Minister, Sibusiso Barnabas Dlamini, on August 1, 2018.

It was gathered that there were nine senior posts that had been made vacant by the promotions conducted by the Ministry of Public Service. 

Tsabedze had confirmed the promotions. He further acknowledged that there was a suspension of promotions; however, these in particular, were old. The PS said the promotions were necessary as stalling them would have rendered the government machinery dysfunctional. He made an example of how a school would fail to operate if a head teacher had retired.

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