Workers’ Unions gun for national shutdown

Zvishavane -Living disparities and troubles bedevilling civil servants have pushed trade unions to the edge as waves of a nationwide shutdown gather momentum, the unions have warned.

Chief among the triggers for the move is the minimal salary pegs that government has been for long allocating civil servants which erode upon payment due the ever rising rates of inflation and exorbitant black market exchange rates.

In an official statement, on July 25 Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ) President Dr Takavafira Zhou said government has been disgraceful in the manner they remunerate civil servants.

“The dice has been cast and there is no going back on ‘National Shutdown’ by civil servants on the 27^th and 28^th of July 2022. All civil servants’ federations (from health sector, education sector, and the rest of civil servants) have agreed on this week’s two-day national shutdown. This united front of civil servants is a product of the realisation by the public sector labour movement (federations and unions) that unless civil servants unite as brothers and sisters in their pursuit of fair labour practices in Zimbabwe, they will perish as fools.

“Urgent restoration of the purchasing power parity of salaries of civil servants as before October 2018 is basis for our call. This entails paying civil servants in US$ with teachers demanding US$ 540 that they were getting before October 2018.

“Harmonization of labour laws that would allow civil servants to have robust collective bargaining chambers under section 65 of the constitution and in line with Conventions 87, 98, 151 and 154 of the International Labour Organization (ILO). To this effect, civil servants have abandoned the current collective bargaining platforms with government in which the latter has been sending people that cannot make decisions for the so called negotiations and with cabinet unilaterally pegging salaries without input from workers,” he said.

Another communiqué from the Zimbabwe Professional Nurses Union (ZPNU) on the victimization of nurses highlighted how the economic meltdown has affected and worsened the nurses’ state of affairs considering the penury salaries.

“With reference to the victimization of nurses, we wish to confirm if it is your office that has directed Kadoma Hospital and Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals to call nurses for disciplinary hearings for participating in industrial action of June  202022.

“We further request your office to advice hospital management to stop victimizing the nurses in all public hospitals.

“We reiterate our commitment to work with other unions and federations in pursuit of workers’ legitimate labour rights. We urge all workers in Zimbabwe to send an unwavering, unflinching and unequivocal message to the employer that civil servants are angry, hungry, apprehensive, wallowing in poverty and misery and that the employer must restore the purchasing power parity of their salaries denominated in US$,” read the communiqué.

The nursing sector has been for long crying out for standard salary payment in US dollars in order to run away from the pillaging inflationary rate.

APEX board member Tapiwanashe Kusotera recently highlighted the struggles facing nurses to the Ministry of Health after nurses and doctors were fired for staging a strike.