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Reuters reports that the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu), one of the largest affiliates of union federation Cosatu, said on Friday that current wage agreement was sacrosanct and not open for review.
The union’s comments came after President Cyril Ramaphosa said the government was speaking to unions about measures to contain the public sector wage bill. The public wage bill is a key worry for ratings agencies as it accounts for about a third of consolidated government expenditure. “We note that the president stated that the government is engaged with unions on reducing spending ... These discussions are not collective bargaining engagements on the salaries and conditions of service — we would never allow the undermining of this. The current wage agreements are sacrosanct and not open for review,” Nehawu’s statement on the matter read. The government agreed a three-year, public sector wage deal in 2018 that runs until the end of March 2021. Nehawu indicated that it has not yet received a mandate from its members about how to negotiate over salaries from April 2021. Fitch Ratings agency said on Friday that it did not expect finance minister Tito Mboweni to make clear commitments on reducing the public sector wage bill in his budget speech later this month.
- Read the original of the above report by Alexander Winning at BusinessLive
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