ZCTU says No to salary freeze 31-08-07 |
ZIMBABWE CONGRESS OF TRADE UNIONS says no to SALARY FREEZE
The Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Union (ZCTU) is utterly shocked and dismayed by President Robert Mugabe's illegal move to freeze salaries and wages. This in effect means that the President has solely undertaken to ensure that workers of Zimbabwe remain engulfed in poverty. There is no rationale in freezing salaries when only last week prices of commodities were reviewed upwards - what hypocrisy! More over, already workers are disadvantaged even though government keeps on harping about the price cuts. No goods are found in conventional shop shelves forcing workers to turn to the black market in order to put food on the table.
In fact the use of the Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures) Act is unacceptable in a democracy and flies in the face of the recently signed Incomes and Prices Stabilization Protocol that seeks to link wages and salaries to the Poverty Datum Line (PDL).
The move by the State means that battle lines have been drawn between the ZCTU and government as the latter, through the Presidential Powers (Temporary Measures), has ordered that there be no salary increments in the next six months, contrary to the spirit of tripartism. The Tripartite Negotiating Forum functions under social dialogue have now been usurped by the government. This means that we keep on going round in circles and never stick to agreed programmes of action to finding lasting solutions to the crisis in Zimbabwe.
President Mugabe, it would seem, is not in touch with the reality on the ground and we wonder on what planet he lives. It is no secret at all that he is well catered for- he has never slept on an empty stomach, he has never walked from State house to his Munhumutapa offices, his children have never been chased away from school because they had not paid fees, and he has never experienced water and electricity cuts. Freezing wages and salaries when an average wage in the industry is $1 million is tantamount to condemning all Zimbabweans to poverty.
The government ratified International Labour Organization Convention 98 on the Right to Collective Bargaining. This Convention requires the government to provide measures to encourage and promote full utilization of machinery for voluntary negotiation between employers' organizations and workers' organizations. The resultant effect of the salary freeze is that workers are now subjected to forced labour as they are working for inadequate salaries imposed by the government.
The workers are tired of being sacrificial lambs and bearing the brunt of bad governance and bad economic policies. Labour demands a return to sanity from government. We will leave no stone unturned in opposing this ill-thought move. The ZCTU will continue to mobilize workers to resist this satanic move which is not only economically wrong, but also morally suicidal.
President Robert Mugabe's government has failed to run this country and he should be man enough and call it quits.
We cannot have a country run on the whims of an individual who appears to have no clue on how to run it.
31 August 2007
Wellington Chibebe
SECRETARY GENERAL