Pretoria - The City of Tshwane has been given 10 days from last Thursday to pay workers 5.4% salary increase, in line with the collective agreement it reached with the labour unions.
The SA Local Government Bargaining Council issued a compliance order against the municipality for failing to honour its part of the salary agreement concluded on September 15, 2021.
In the order written by the council’s labour and compliance manager, Zamanguni Khuzwayo, the municipality was found wanting for “failing to implement the 5.4% to benefits and conditions of service that ordinarily increase by virtue of the increase in the salary of an employee”.
The order was made after workers took to the street to vent their frustration after they did not receive an increase on July 26.
For three days, striking workers demonstrated outside Tshwane House, demanding that the municipality honour its part of the salary agreement.
The Independent Municipal and Allied Trade Union (Imatu) and the SA Municipal Workers’ Union (Samwu) would monitor if the municipality would comply with the salary and wage collective agreement within 10 days.
According to Imatu, if the metro failed to comply, it would then have to be subjected to a compliance arbitration.
The union was concerned that the municipality had not budgeted for the increase despite the fact that the salary and wage agreement was concluded between Imatu and the SA Local Government Association in 2021, providing for a 5.4% salary increase that was to take effect from July 1, 2023.
“Imatu, therefore, submitted an application to the South African Local Government Bargaining Council for a compliance order against the municipality.
“Imatu is pleased that the order has been granted. The City of Tshwane is bound by the salary and wage collective agreement and cannot simply decide not to abide by its terms,” the union said.
Imatu chairperson in the Tshwane region Melita Baloyi expressed disappointment that the union had to go through the compliance order route to force the employer to do right by its employees and to adhere to the agreement to implement the 5.4% salary increase.
“This increase was due and payable on July 26, 2023, but Imatu members did not see the increase added to their salaries on this date.
“This comes against the background of a sluggish economy and high increases in the costs of transportation, school fees, and the City of Tshwane’s water, rates, and electricity tariff hikes, among other social and financial challenges,” she said.
Samwu, on the other hand, urged the City to comply with the order of all councillors in the council “to ensure that the administration acts as directed by the bargaining council”.
“Should the council fail to ensure that the administration complies with the order, it will be complicit and enablers of the administration in denying workers their salary increases for the second time in three years.
“We will, as a union, be monitoring the implementation of this order while also continuing the fight for the implementation of the 2021 3.5% salary increase, which the City failed to implement,” the union said.
Addressing striking workers outside Tshwane House on Friday, Mayor Cilliers Brink said council agreed on a mandate to seek an exemption for the salary increases.
“It was not a decision that was taken lightly. It was not a decision that was taken to punish workers. We know that services in this city depend on the workers,” he said.
Brink said even though the municipality might not pay Rand Water and Eskom on time, “we do pay salaries on time, every time”.
“I do not want the City of Tshwane to become one of those municipalities that cannot pay salaries, that cannot pay pensions,” the mayor added.
In a media statement, City spokesperson Selby Bokaba said: “The City of Tshwane has noted the compliance order issued by the bargaining council yesterday (Thursday).
“In it the City is informed of its non-compliance with certain clauses of the bargaining council’s Disciplinary Procedure Collective Agreement for failure to implement the final year of the third-year salary and wage increases to employees.”
He said both Imatu and Samwu were informed in a recent meeting with the city manager, Johann Mettler, and at a subsequent local labour forum meeting that the City was unable to pay the salary and wage increases due to its liquidity challenges.
“The City made it abundantly clear that it was unable to implement the salary and wage increases as it was unaffordable to do so and was in the process of filing an application for exemption to pay the increases. The exemption application will be filed by August 10, 2023,” Bokaba said.
Pretoria News