Samwu provincial secretary Lawrence Fennie indicated that about 100 Renosterberg Local Municipality municipal workers did not receive their salaries in December.
THE South African Municipal Workers’ Union (Samwu) has threatened to withdraw their labour in Petrusville, Phillipstown, and Vanderkloof, as Renosterberg Local Municipality municipal workers did not receive their salaries in December.
Samwu provincial secretary Lawrence Fennie indicated that about 100 workers had a “bleak Christmas”.
“We are giving Renosterberg local municipality until Friday, January 7 to ensure that all workers are paid their salaries with interest. The Provincial Government as mandated by the Constitution should by the stipulated deadline ensure that they have intervened at the municipality.
“The failure to intervene and pay workers their salaries will result in workers withdrawing their labour. We cannot allow municipal workers to be turned into slaves by a democratic government.”
He believed that the municipality should be dissolved as it was unable to deliver services or fulfil its financial duties.
“Provincial government and National Treasury should work together in ensuring that municipalities are properly funded. Long lasting interventions need to be put in place at Renosterberg municipality, to ensure that situations like this do not re-occur in the future.”
He added that in the past two months following the local government elections, the municipality had two municipal managers.
“The first municipal manager abruptly resigned from her position while the second municipal manager appears unable to stabilise the institution.
“Workers now have to bear the brunt of executive failures at the institution, their families could not enjoy Christmas with their families like other workers in the country as they could not put food on the table for them nor buy essentials that are associated with Christmas such as gifts and clothes for their children.
“Of great concern to us is that the municipality has failed to communicate with workers as to when their salaries will be paid. As a result, workers are unable to prepare their children for school when they open in the next few days, their children will be without uniforms, stationery and their fees will go unpaid.”
Fennie called for urgent intervention to prevent the municipality’s bank account from being attached.
“Provincial government must hold bilateral discussions between themselves and Eskom to prevent the municipality bank accounts from being attached as this will have serious implications on service delivery to residents and workers.
“For a long period, the municipality has been failing to pay workers their salaries on time while third parties such as pension funds, medical aids and funeral policies have not been paid for some time.”
The Renosterberg Local Municipality could not be reached for comment.
