Rustenburg - The South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) wants the salaries of municipal managers to be reviewed and regulated, the union said on Thursday.
“These salary disparities will only add to the high levels of inequality in the country, while on the other hand compromising service delivery,” said secretary general Simon Mathe.
“We further call for the regulation of municipal managers' salaries and an urgent review of the determination of upper limits which sets municipal managers' salaries.”
He said the union had learnt with great disappointment of the highly inflated salary increases that municipal managers were in line to receive after being gazetted by the Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Des van Rooyen.
“Effective from July 1, municipal managers will receive as much as R200 000 salary increases which is way more than the annual salary of an ordinary municipal worker,” he said.
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Mathe said the increases would mean that the highest paid municipal manager would receive an unbelievable salary of more than R3.5 million, meaning they would be the highest paid government employees, earning almost double the salary of the president.
“It is very unfortunate, unjust and unfair that municipal managers will now be receiving more than 1 000 times the salary of an ordinary municipal worker and an unbelievable 35 000 times the salary of an Extended Public Works Programme (EPWP) worker.”
He said workers, who were at the forefront of service delivery in municipalities were subjected to slave wages and hunger, while municipal managers were swimming in pools of money.
“Municipal managers should be ashamed that they receive large sums of money monthly while the people who are doing the work for them are entangled in the perpetual circle of poverty, perpetuated by the employer who refuses to pay workers living and decent wages.”
The union was of the view that, since municipal workers were responsible for the delivery of basic services to South Africans, they should be well remunerated.
“It cannot be correct that for two people working in the same municipality, one would receive 35 000 times the salary of the other. It is for this reason that we demand the immediate absorption of EPWP workers into permanent employees of municipalities so they can receive better salaries with benefits and job security,” he said.
“We further demand the immediate and total banning of the use of EPWP to deliver services in municipalities as this system has shown its exploitative nature and cannot be regarded as job creation.”
AFRICAN NEWS AGENCY