CIVIL servants, through the Apex Council, yesterday
rejected government’s pay offer of a 50% raise and US$75 allowance for three
months as doctors and nurses declared a full-blown strike.
Protests by nurses started at Parirenyatwa Hospital and
later spread to Mpilo Central in Bulawayo, Chinhoyi Hospital and Sally Mugabe
Hospital, among others. Police were called in the morning to disperse the protesting
nurses at Parirenyatwa.
The disgruntled health workers at Mpilo criticised their
employer for giving them paltry increments which were not commensurate with the
galloping inflation.
Some of the placards carried by the Mpilo health workers
read: “50% of zero is zero”, “Frontliners being given peanuts really! Please
have mercy on us” and “We are professional not slaves”.
One of the nurses, who spoke on condition of anonymity for
fear of victimisation, said they were working without personal protective
equipment, sanitisers and risking coronavirus infection.
“We come to work because we love our jobs, nursing is a
calling. We chose this profession because we want to save lives, but if the
situation is not conducive for us to do our work, we have no option but to put
our tools down,” the nurse said.
The nurses demanded that citizens and the State broadcaster
ZBC stop tarnishing their image on social media as they perform their duties,
but were rewarded with slave wages and poor working conditions.
Mpilo Hospital acting chief executive officer Solwayo
Ngwenya declined to comment on the matter saying those protesting were seeking
an audience with their employer, not the hospital administration.
“You must phone the nurses association and employers in
Harare as the nurses are demonstrating against their employer, not me,” Ngwenya
said.
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Zimbabwe Nurses Association (Zina) president Enock Dongo on
Wednesday said the health workers were poorly paid.
“Nurses now want salaries in US dollars. They want money
that has purchasing power,” he said.
He said the least-paid nurses were earning a net monthly
salary of $2 000 and warned that the boycott could continue and spread to other
hospitals.
The health workers, under the Health Apex Council,
yesterday formally informed their employer, the Health Services Board (HSB)
that they had with immediate effect embarked on a strike over meagre salaries
rendered useless by the harsh economic climate.
Other health workers like pharmacy technicians,
radiographers, midwives, medical specialists in training as well as hospital
food services supervisors also joined in the strike.
The leaders of all the 14 health workers unions and
associations signed an official letter of notification for withdrawal of labour
delivered to the HSB.
The development came after they spent the whole of
Wednesday locked up in a meeting following the Parirenyatwa protests and the
subsequent announcement of a new salary offer by government on the same day.
“This letter serves to inform you that the health workers
as you might have witnessed have taken matters into their own hands and have
withdrawn their services,” the letter by the health labour unions, read.
“Therefore, we would like to officially communicate as the
Health Apex that health workers have with immediate effect withdrawn their
services until their demands have been met.”
The health workers claimed they communicated with
government on May 23 over the harsh economic situation in the country and the
issue of price hikes, but there was no response as well as the convening of the
Health Service Board negotiating platform.
“Since that date, the country’s economic situation has
continued to deteriorate with the annual inflation reaching 785% and the
exchange rate reaching $90 to 1 USD… the current $3 000 salary for health
workers cannot sustainably take care of their families under the prevailing
socio-economic conditions…”
Some of the health workers representatives, who appended
their signatures on the letter, include Zina president Dongo, Zimbabwe Hospital
Doctors Association leader Dean Ndoro, Zimbabwe Confederation of Midwives
chairperson Netsai Marowa, Senior Hospital Doctors Association chairperson
Admire Jira and Moses Chikuni from the Zimbabwe Professional Nurses Union.
In a related development, civil servants through their
supreme representative body, the Apex Council, yesterday also rejected a 50%
pay hike announced by government.
Apex Council chairperson Cecilia Alexander effectively
derailed government’s plan to please its restive workers by rejecting the offer
on the basis that the body was not consulted prior to the adjustments.
“Matters to do with conditions of service have to be a
product of consultations between social partners at forums provided for at law.
No party should unilaterally decide for others as is the case here,” Alexander
said.
The Apex Council leader also pointed out that the US$75
allowance is “thumb-suck and not with our input” further urging government to
call an emergency meeting to resolve the impasse.
She added that Apex Council was happy that it had finally
dawned on government which previously insisted on sole use of the moribund
Zimbabwe dollar currency, that the economy had actually dollarised.
Teachers also rejected the government offer, demanding the
restoration of US-pegged salaries that were turned into local currency without
factoring the parallel market exchange rate.
Progressive Teachers Union president Takavafira Zhou said
the 50% salary increase was not a product of negotiation and fell far short of
teachers’ minimum expectation of US$550. Newsday
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