Rabasimane wondered why the emptiness of the state coffers is always the excuse when it comes to implementing salary increases for the workers who toil to make up the riches of the country.
However, he surprised that when it comes to implementing salaries and other benefits for the politicians, the emptiness of coffers doesn’t stop such implementations.
“It’s surprising that when it comes to priorities for councillors, MPs and Ministers, why can’t their demands and expectations be affected by the emptiness of the coffers, or makgwakgwa (emptiness) becomes more pronounced when it comes to workers only,” he wondered.
He contends that after recent adjustments of the benefits of Ministers including hefty amounts for furniture, “it’s showing that the priorities are only skewed towards politicians.”
“There is a claim that the recently implemented upward movement of benefits for Ministers was started by the previous regime, why couldn’t they withhold it because talk in the government enclave has been belt tightening,” Rabasimane suggested.
He added: “They should have waited a bit rather than rushing to implement such an increase when there is a concern about the emptiness of the State coffers.”
“The powers that be should be looking at the needs of workers as critical rather than rushing to implement their needs.”
“In our Setswana culture, we know that the elders dish for the children first before dishing for themselves. Now, we are witnessing our elders piling up benefits for themselves leaving us wailing for their attention.”
Rabasimane warned that they would not accept such a development where the elders have no consideration for the creators of the national wealth they are feasting on.
According to Rabasimane, they strongly believe that there is a lot of wastage within the government sector, which is responsible for the state the government finds itself in.
Amongst others, Rabasimane indicated that government owes a lot of money.
He cited litigation as an opening through which government continues to lose large sums of money that could be deployed elsewhere.
Rabasimane, who is also the deputy CEO of the National Amalgamated Local, Central Government and Parastatal Workers Union or Manual Workers, was also worried that state attorneys are not fully utilised with many services outsourced further emptying the State coffers.
“It will be important to utilise the services of attorneys in government employ rather than looking elsewhere as it’s the case at the moment further accumulating hefty legal bills,” he bemoaned.
Rabasimane is also worried that government does not take good care of its property. He cited the Central Transport Organisation (CTO) fuel points which he described as old and leaking with fuel simply going to waste through unnecessary leakages.
“Government should do a proper audit of some of the services,” he said.
Rabasimane was also worried about the government’s recruitment processes, which he described as front-end loader with majority of recruitment for executive positions dominating.
The trade unionist bemoaned the reality that the councils are functioning with five deputy council secretaries, which he said, will come at a massive cost to the government, more so that they are at an executive E2 scale.
He also decried the fact that some Permanent Secretaries do not fit into the Peterson pay structure because some people were recruited from elsewhere with higher salaries.
His advice was that government should stick to the White Paper when people are being recruited.
