Johannesburg - The proposed national minimum wage (NMW) isn't a living or decent wage, but an attempt to address inequality and the problems of the country’s working poor, says Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa.
South Africans criticised the proposed NMW rate of R20 an hour, or about R3 500 a month, on social media yesterday after Ramaphosa released an expert-panel report recommending the amounts.
Public sentiment varied from rage to disbelief as some Twitter users complained that the figure wouldn't make a dent on poverty.
Read also: Minimum wage: EFF rejects proposal
Ramaphosa said the process was now open to social partners at the National Economic Development and Labour Council (Nedlac) and the public to comment on the feasibility of the recommendations in the report.
While the proposed R3 500 can't lift the poorest South Africans out of crippling poverty, it would go a long way in offering relief to 41.6 percent of workers earning less than R3 000 a month.
Labour and community constituencies at Nedlac wanted the level to be set between R3 700 and R4 500, an amount the panel concluded would put employers under pressure and lead to job losses.
“Clearly this isn't a living wage, and we need to be clear on that; we need to (do) a lot more,” Ramaphosa said. “But this is an attempt in dealing with unemployment, wage poverty and inequality.”
He expected ratings agencies, currently in the country to evaluate South Africa’s credit standing, to see that an effort was being made to revive the economy and create harmonious labour market conditions.
“I will be outlining the contents of this report to them, they would have received the executive summary and heard what was being said. We are being positive and forward looking, and we are informing them that we have made a lot of progress on the labour instability issue and reached agreement on key issues. We've also agreed on how best we can try to prevent long strikes from having a negative impact on the economy, on workers, on businesses.”
Wits University researcher and co-ordinator of the NMW Research Initiative, Gilad Isaacs, described the proposed rate as a good recommendation.
However, like Ramaphosa, he cautioned against unrealistic expectations.
“The national minimum wage is not a wage level that is a decent wage, or a living wage, or what a worker really needs to live a good life, and unfortunately that isn't really the purpose of what a national minimum wage is. A national minimum wage is about setting a wage floor under which no worker can earn.”
Meanwhile, the Nedlac task team looking into other issues, including labour unrest, announced an agreement on the balloting of strikes, an initiative labour rejected despite its inclusion in the Labour Relations Act, saying it would infringe on workers’ right to strike.
Unions have been granted a grace period to include strike balloting in their constitutions before the signing of the agreement.
Federation of Unions of South Africa general secretary Dennis George said Fedusa was relieved to have settled the ballot matter.
“The situation of balloting is about a deficit of trust. Why would you ask another person to verify what is happening and being done by another party? It's important that labour was arguing that kind of things.”
Cosatu’s Neil Coleman said that while the federation needed to consult its members for a mandate, it welcomed an intervention that took parties a step closer to a final NMW policy.
“There’s a lot of meat in the report. We won’t necessarily agree with everything in it, but at least it's now a basis for us to engage.”