GOVERNMENT has released K54 million to pay council workers their two months salary arrears using the harmonized salaries and conditions of services, Local Government and Housing Minister Emerine Kabanshi has said.
Ms Kabanshi said the K 54 million grant released to the local authorities would also go towards supporting them to pay salaries to officers in divisions one, two and three for August and September this year.
Ms Kabanshi has since urged all striking council employees to report for work failure to which disciplinary action would be taken.
“I am pleased to inform the nation that Government has now released K 54 million operational grants towards support to councils to pay salaries to officers in certain divisions for two months, government has also provided funds for payment of two months salaries to all 68 new officers on first appointment employed by Local Government Service Commission posted to various councils.
“According to information I received, only 21 councils nationwide had withdrawn labour due to nonpayment of two months salary arrears, this strike action was unnecessary and illegal because there was no dispute declared between the employer and employees.” she said.
Addressing journalists at her office yesterday, Ms Kabanshi warned that government would not condone high levels of indiscipline, abuse of public resources and disregarding the ministry’s guidance in the utilization of funds.
Ms Kabanshi said the ministry had commissioned a countrywide audit of the harmonized salaries and conditions of service for a period of one year since August last year to September 2013.
She said the amounts which would be disbursed to the councils were gross amounts as they included payments for net salaries, Statutory pension contributions to the Local Authorities Superannuation Fund (LASF), Nation Pensions Schemes Authority (NAPSA) and Union membership dues.
She said her ministry was aware that there were some councils that had deliberately chosen not to pay the harmonized salaries as approved by government and were paying contrary to the approved harmonized structures.
Meanwhile,Ms Kabanshi has said her ministry has suspended two directors, for Engineering and Finance at Livingstone City Council to pave way for investigations into allegations of illegally paying themselves hefty salaries beyond their conditions of service.
Ms Kabanshi said the suspension of two Livingstone City Council directors should serve as a warning to all councils against the abuse public resources.
Councils are like orphans, why are they still having arrears when we were informed that government would pay them like other public servants? It’s No Money in Council Workers Pockets.
Why are councils so unproductive? I don’t see sense in a whole council depending on the central government when they have a huge tax base such as markets which house a lot of marketeers.Remove politicians from running the affairs of the council,then you will have money to pay your workers.
good point there.
Honestly do you have any idea how much councils make per day in markets? 50ngwe per marketeer on a daily basis, have you taken time to see how many towns has huge markets?, trading licenses only come once per year, rates only twice a year and you are forgetting about the responsibilities the councils have like daily activities for garbage collection, work on rural roads and what about operational costs? think outside the box. the government has taken most of the taxes which councils used to benefit from. Only Councils as big as Lusaka are able to sustain themselves because of the huge revenue basket they have as a city. so try to inquire more before you make such remarks.
@ZAMCAB
I totally agree with your observation. This is a strange way of doing things. Why must the local government depend on central government for finance? its total madness and does not make any sense at all.
Under the MMD government they used to go for more than six months without pay.Challange this fact.
Sinkongole yamene iyi? Paying salaries using kaloba. Funny indeed.
muli sata abantu bacha