SOUTH AFRICA
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) says the Government should conduct an audit of the Public Service to determine where shortages and surpluses exist.
The Government is under pressure to slash the public sector wage bill which currently stands at about R600 billion ($A60.3 billion) or 35 per cent of its annual spending.
Minister for Finance, Tito Mboweni’s Budget later this month is expected to focus on reining in Government spending and plans to curb the public sector wage bill in order to stave off a looming fiscal crisis.
Deputy Minister for Finance, David Masondo (pictured) suggested in December that the National Treasury was mulling wage freezes for public sector employees, which angered Cosatu.
Unions have threatened to protest outside Parliament when Mr Mboweni delivers his Budget and, if that failed, to “shut down Government indefinitely and render the system ungovernable”.
Public sector unions and the Government are on a collision course in 2020, with the next round of public sector wage negotiations set to take place in the second half of the year.
Cosatu has called for an end to the “unwarranted attacks” on public sector workers and their “right to earn a living” — a tacit reference to Government Ministers such as Mr Mboweni.
It said that instead of retrenchments and wage freezes, the Public Service should be audited to determine where gaps and surpluses exist — these could then be addressed through reskilling and redeploying public sector workers according to where they were needed.
As an example, Cosatu said excess Defence Force personnel could be redeployed to the Revenue Service, Customs and the police.
It also called for an investigation into ‘ghost posts’, particularly at Provincial level, in State-owned entities and Municipalities.
Pretoria, 1 February 2020
