As the cash-strapped government pushes on with its rejected 3% pay offer to more than 1.3-million public servants from Thursday, unions say they will down tools next week to back their demands for above-inflation increases.
Strike certificates have been issued to Cosatu’s largest affiliates, including the National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (Nehawu), the Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) and the Democratic Nursing Organisation of SA (Denosa). The SA Policing Union (Sapu) and the Health and Other Service Personnel Trade Union of SA (Hospersa) also got strike certificates and are considering going on strike.
Should they go on strike, key government services in their sectors will come to a standstill. These include border control, revenue collection and maintenance of law and order.
“On Thursday, we are having a joint media conference of public service unions. We are going to outline our programme of action,” said Nehawu spokesperson Lwazi Nkolonzi.
Popcru spokesperson Richard Mamabolo said the union was busy concluding its programme of action.
His Sapu counterpart, Lesiba Thobakgale, said: “We [have] concluded [drafting] picketing rules and are working hand-in-hand with other trade unions in the public service admitted in the PSCBC, to take our struggle forward in preparation [for] any demonstration, picket or strike action.”
SA Democratic Teachers Union (Sadtu) spokesperson Nomusa Cembi said that union won’t be part of the strike next week. “We are not in dispute with the employer because we accepted the 3% offer,” she said.
Sadtu is joined by the National Professional Teachers’ Organisation of SA and the Suid-Afrikaanse Onderwysersunie, both of which have accepted the employer’s final, revised 3% pay offer.
The public service unions demanded a 10% increase at the start of negotiations in May, but lowered the figure to 6.5% in line with the Reserve Bank’s headline inflation rate forecast for 2022.
But when acting public service & administration minister Thulas Nxesi announced he would unilaterally implement the 3% offer, which includes a R1,000 after-tax cash gratuity that ends in March 2023, the unions reverted to their 10% demand.
The planned strike comes after the Public Servants Association (PSA), representing more than 235,000 public servants, embarked on a one-day strike across the country last week, demanding that the employer accede to workers’ demands for a 10% salary hike.
The union gave the government, which has been trying to rein in growth of the public sector wage bill of more than R660bn to an average annual rate of 1.8%, seven days to respond to its demands.
Department of public service & administration spokesperson Moses Mushi told Business Day on Tuesday the employer would not respond to the PSA.
“There is nothing to respond to. The government tabled its final 3% offer. We are implementing the offer starting this week Thursday. So if there’s anything that can be done, they [PSA] must go back to the public service co-ordinating bargaining council [PSCBC],” said Mushi.
PSA assistant GM Reuben Maleka said the union would intensify its strike action by strategies such as a joint industrial action planned for next week Tuesday.
“Obviously, on November 22 all trade unions in the public service sector will be going for a total shutdown of the industry. That’s basically where we are going to start. We are not deterred by the employer going ahead with implementation of the 3% offer,” said Maleka.
The PSA’s one-day strike followed a deadlock in negotiations at the PSCBC recently, resulting in the union receiving a strike certificate. This was after Nxesi implemented the government’s final offer of a 3% increase as per the numbers in finance minister Enoch Godongwana’s medium-term budget policy statement on October 26.
Godongwana told Business Day recently: “As far as I am concerned, we have pencilled in 3% and we have pencilled [that] for the next few years as part of the carry-through costs of that 3%. Whether there will be an agreement above that I can’t say, but I doubt [it]. There’s no money. That’s all I know.”
The wage bill eats up more than a third of government spending. Each percentage point in the public sector pay deal costs the fiscus R6.5bn, or about 0.1% of GDP
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