Government urged to increase public servants salaries
Correspondent | Wednesday August 10, 2016 15:30
Masunga, a former councillor for Itekeng ward, made his passionate plea during the tour of the Presidential Inspectorate Team that was headed by former assistant minister of health, Gaotlhaetse Matlhabaphiri, at the Civic Centre hall on Monday.
The team was in Francistown to solicit views from members of the public on how various government poverty eradication programmes can be improved in order to benefit their beneficiaries.
The team also visited the new interchange road construction commonly known as ‘spaghetti’ to get an update on its progress.
Masunga said some workers who have political interests are determined to sabotage government’s efforts of taking services to the people effectively and have literarily held the government at ransom.
“Some civil servants with political agendas have politicised the public service. There is practically a general go-slow across government departments. The public servants want to use that as their bargaining tool for government to increase their salaries. This has resulted in government programmes aimed at empowering the youth and the general populace failing,” said Masunga.
He advised government to increase the salaries of the public servants to address their grievances.
He added: “Some public servants have overstayed in one place for a very long time. It is high time that they are transferred to other places in an endeavour to prevent this issue of go-slow.”
In another related development, Masunga urged officers of various government departments offering poverty eradication programmes to speed up the process of approving beneficiaries because failure to do so makes many people especially the youth lose hope of ever benefiting from the programmes.
“Some people who have applied to be assisted since 2012 have not being assisted. I think this makes them not trust the government,” said Masunga.
Masunga’s words were echoed by the Member of Parliament (MP) for Francistown West, Ignatius Moswaane.
Moswaane said some civil servants with political agendas were frustrating government’s efforts of taking services to the people including the youth who want to benefit from poverty eradication programmes.
Meanwhile, members of the public who attended the consultative meeting also expressed mixed feelings about the various poverty eradication programmes.
Itumeleng Joseph who was funded to start a bakery project said that since he was funded in 2013, he has managed to build a house and purchased three cars.
“I have employed six people. I thank government for having assisted me to graduate from poverty,” said Joseph.
However, Annah Jimane who was funded to start a landscaping business complained that the money she was given to buy machinery was not enough and pleaded with government to increase it.
The district youth coordinator at the ministry of youth, sport and culture, Minkie Bokole pleaded with parents and civic leaders to urge beneficiaries of various poverty eradication programmes to repay their loans so that others can also benefit.
Bokole said some beneficiaries disappear without any trace after being funded, which is contrary to the contract they entered into with government.
In response to some of the questions asked by the attendants at the event, the District commissioner for Francistown Codelia Mpape said grievances stemming from the 2011 strike over salary increase are not the reason for public servants engaging in a go-slow.
“The 2011 public servants strike may have delayed the implementation of some government projects. Go-slow may have happened after 2011 but for now I don’t think it is a contributing factor for the delay in implementation of government projects. We don’t have any backlog of people who were not assisted save for one department which is 93% complete,” said Mpape.
Matlhabaphiri also encouraged beneficiaries of government programmes to repay their loans.
He encouraged public servants to speed up the process of assisting the poor to access government’s poverty eradication programmes.