|
In the case BULGSA says that the job evaluation exercise, whose results came out last March, was not done in accordance with the High Court order of 1999. The order had instructed the Establishment Secretary (ES) to do the grading of posts in the Local Authorities as per Section 5 of the Unified Local Government Service (ULGS) Act. “What is in contention is that the upper panel which was composed of the Permanent Secretaries from the central government disregarded the recommendations of the lower panel which was chaired by the ES,” said the BULGSA publicity secretary, Moshe Noga. He added that the lower panel recommended grades that would harmonise the disparities between the local government and the central government. Noga told Mmegi that the ES presided over the lower panel and later sat in the upper panel to participate in undoing what the lower panel had recommended under his chairmanship.
The attorney representing BULGSA in the matter, Victor Moupo yesterday said: “We believe that the ES abdicated his statutory duties and ended up sharing his duties with people who are not empowered to perform such duties of the ES”. Moupo argued that those who sat in the upper panel did not have the powers to do so. He regarded the act as a serious usurpation of power by those who sat in the panel (upper) and failed to correct the disparity between the central and local government employees.
In 2002, BULGSA members engaged in a crippling strike that brought services in the local authorities to a standstill. The strike was meant to pressurise the government to implement the 1999 court order and the disparities with central government.
Addressing the 28th BULGSA annual general conference in December 2002, President Festus Mogae pleaded with the trade unionists not to engage in strikes “as strikes could cripple the economy of the country and in a way subject ordinary Batswana to immense prejudice”. But Mogae could not commit his government that it would obey the decision of the court.
|
