THE PUBLIC SECTOR SALARY REVIEW OUTCOMES BEING CONTESTED BY THE GOVERNMENT EVEN BEFORE BEING PUBLISHED

 

Written by Fundizwi Sikhondze

The current Eswatini Government has in the past four years employed several tricks that invariably aimed to delay the review of salaries and grading for the over 40 000 central administration public service workers.  The contestation is believed to have emanated from a desire to clamp down on a wage bill increase. However in 2024 finally concrete progress was finally recorded as a consultant was selected and appointed to carry out the study for implementation in 2025/26 financial year.

However a year later and at the time that the study report should be delivered and implemented it seems that the contestation continues as new barriers are being put in place to either water down or weaken the outcomes of the salary review and job grading study. The barriers include Global Financial Institutions in the form of the World Bank Group who recently released a report basically calling for the reduction of public service workers’ salaries even amidst an escalating cost of living.

To give a bit of background the public service salary review was last implemented in the 2016/17 financial year and through that exercise public service workers got their salaries adjusted by around 20%. Some jobs were awarded pay level increases in line with jobs grading recommendations of the same study. At implementation a collective agreement was signed by the government and the PSUs and this agreement was to the effect that the next salary review would be held around 2020, around three or four years down the line. It never did and got pushed forward.

What happened in the period from 2020 became a roller coaster filled with arbitrary postponements, , tensions but basically it soon became clear that the government had no intention of commissioning the salary review study, let alone implement its findings that would lead to an increased wage bill.

It ought to be also noted that controlling the wage bill is one of the key promises by the current government with ministers such as the Minister of Finance Neal Rijkenberg being at the forefront of that drive. This stance has been backed by agreements with GFI's such as the Fiscal Adjustment Roadmap which has made the finance ministry to  intensify control of the the wage bill. 

Some of the tricks employed have included awarding below inflation Cost of Living (COLA) increases as well as the application of draconian controls on hiring.

It is now history that after several years where tensions were at times at boiling point and where the government resorted to altering the collective bargaining process in order to coerce public service workers to accept below inflation COLA, in 2024 finally the salary review/job grading study took off. The consultant to conduct the study was appointed and they finally began the work of interviewing all stakeholders for the purpose of properly grading the jobs and determining the level at which the salaries ought to be increased.

In 2025 while public service workers eagerly anticipate the release of the study report and its implementation it seems that the contestation continues with different weapons this time around, including the media.  emerging. 

For starters in his budget delivered on 14^th February 2025 the finance minister only provided about E500 million for the implementation of the salary review/jobs grading possibly inclusive of COLA for the year 2025/26. A quick calculation reveals with a wage bill around E10 billion, the E500 million budgeted is equivalent to about 5% of the wage bill which means that if there will be a figure implemented across the board at the conclusion of the salary review that figure will be in the region of 5% of the current salaries.

However tit ought to be noted that here is still a good possibility that different percentages may be implemented across different jobs and pay levels. There could also be instances where certain jobs are downgraded or allocated pay levels that are less than what they currently paid. Minister Neal has already hinted that if the salary review report is good it must indicate the salary levels that must be reduced. This perhaps reveals the thinking behind the allocation of E500million by the government.

Public Service Unions after a joint negotiations meeting with the government team reported to their members through the online platform, The SNAT Platform,  that when they quizzed  the government team about the E500million budget , the response was that the funds were for purposes of place holding, otherwise the government were ready to provide any additional funds as will be required to implement the salary review recommendations.

Pictured Above: A press cut from a media editorial in February 2025 titled, "No reward for mediocrity: Civil Servants pay demands unacceptable".

Towards the end of February 2025 the government, through the Ministry of Economic Development in conjunction with the World Bank Group launched a report called, Eswatini Public Finance Review, leveraging Fiscal Adjustment for Better Development Outcomes. This report appears to be putting the spanner in the works for increase in the  public service wage bill and has become the new primary tool to contest the salary review process as a whole. 

This WB report in short calls for reduction of public service salaries. This they do by implying that  public service workers earn salaries that are much higher that private sector workers as well by providing a narrative that suggested that the fiscal adjustment mechanisms, that has included freezing on hiring of health and education workers, had already done wonders to bring the public service wage bill to around 30%. This analysis has ofcourse been made without the necessary cost analysis to public services that have been compromised in the period of the fiscal adjustment.

Local newspaper group the Times of Eswatini has joined the contestation campaign with coverage as well as editorials and opinion pieces from senior reporters. In their editions on Saturday and Sunday 22 and 23 February 2025. On Saturday 22 February columnist and senior reporter Mduduzi Magagula boldly proclaimed that, “Civil servants too costly to maintain” and on Sunday 23 February 2025 senior reporter and columnist Mfanukhona Nkambule wrote that "High wage bill can cripple govt systems”.

                   

Pictured Above: A Times of Eswatini opinion pieces by Mfanukhona Nkhambule and Mduduzi Magagula

Mass resignations risk

One of the challenges that can emanate from a stagnant public service wage trajectory may be that there could be a high risk of high rates of early withdrawals of workers from service (resignations) which may in turn overburden the pension fund with having to make funds available earlier than anticipated for these withdrawals, many of whom will start drawing monthly pension stipends from the fund because they world have taken early retirement which they are entitled to after reaching age 45. This having observed elsewhere is done so that these workers can gain access to their pension to try to balance their life needs which may be university education for their children and other needs.

For now the pressure is high on the consultants to deliver a report that can be acceptable particularly to public service workers as they believe they have waited for too long without their salaries being reviewed and therefore deserve larger increases. On the other hand it seems the government is not prepared to dole out huge figures to cushion public service workers whose salaries have been battered and eroded for the past nine (9) years .