Public servants propose 13.5 percent salary increment

Botswana Federation of Public Sector Union (BOFEPUSU) has proposed a 13.5 percent salary increment for public servants for the financial year 2016/17.

According to a document passed on to Botswana Guardian, BOFEPUSU proposes a salary increment of 13.5 percent for all the parties that fall under its mandate. The federation states that the financial year’s budget is made under slightly better financial environment unlike the previous ones.

The position of the federation is that the planned Economic Stimulus Package will result in funds being injected into the economy and believe that the employees will also not be forgotten considering their understanding during recession times when they went for longer period without an increment.
 
Affiliates of BOFEPUSU are Botswana Teachers’ Union (BTU), Botswana Sectors of Educators Trade Union (BOSETU), National Amalgamated Local and Central Government and Parastatal Workers’ Union (NALCGPWU) and Botswana Land Boards Local Authorities and Health Workers Union (BLLAHWU). Botswana Public Employees Union (BOPEU) resolved to withdraw its affiliation from the federation on Wednesday this week during its elective congress in Palapye.
 
“Botswana has recorded better economic growth averaging 6 percent since 2010. Inflation is at its lowest in decades and has since fell (sic) below the Bank of Botswana long-term objective of 3-6 percent. What it implies is that the real wages are getting eroded at lesser rate than in the past and therefore a significant salary increment will help boost households and stimulate the small business sector growth”, reads the proposal.
 
Labour productivity the federation says has marginally increased as measured by the crude labour productivity index. This may require some reward to employees for their contribution to the productivity. It is argued that there is a big gap between inflation and salary adjustments due to small adjustments compared to previous year’s annual inflation and the fact that there were no salary adjustments in some years. The federation says, “The 13.5 percent will translate into a wage bill increment of P1.6 billion.”
 
The union party is of the opinion that the proposed increment is affordable. The union collective calculated the wage bill of employees falling under the Public Service Act (PSA) to be P12, 030,504,688.5 and therefore a 13.5 percent increment will result in an increment of P1, 624,118, 132.95.

“The union team also wants the negotiations to exclude Members of Parliament, Councillors and Dikgosi since they got up to 40 percent salary increment on top of the 6 percent that was negotiated for the public service employees during the 2015/16 salary negotiations. Negotiations should only be done to benefit only the employees governed by the PSA of 2008”.
 
BOFEPUSU has indicated that since 2010/11, Botswana has been preparing a Budget Strategy Paper whose main objectives are to inform stakeholders on the national budget process and provide a forum for discussions of national priorities. It says the Budget Strategy Paper for 2015/16 was prepared under a more optimistic domestic economic outlook.

The 2016/17 Budget Strategy Paper has projected a deficit budget, said BOFEPUSU adding that “According to estimates, total revenue and grants are projected to increase marginally by 2.9 percent to P46. 06 billion in 2014/15. The major expected drivers of this revenue decline are due to declines in mineral revenue.”
 
The federation explained in its 22-page proposal document that the ongoing debates on Southern African Customs Union (SACU) revenue sharing formula continue to bring uncertainty on the earnings. However, BOFEPUSU expressed confidence that negotiations will not in any way dampen the revenue since the previous standing formula has always proved to be stable.

BOFEPUSU states that on the domestic revenue side, Botswana Unified Revenue Services (BURS) continues to improve in collection and based on current projections, the revenue service entity is expected to reach its target.
 
“BOFEPUSU believes that more efforts can be done to improve tax collection especially from large corporations if government interference is reduced.” In October 2015 Global growth for 2015 is projected at 3.1 percent, 0.3 percentage point lower than in 2014, and 0.2 percentage point below the forecasts in the July 2015 World Economic Outlook (WEO) update.

According to the latest data from Statistics Botswana, domestic economy grew, in real terms, by 4.4 percent in 2014 compared to 9.3 percent in 2013. A positive aspect of the 2014 growth is that, it was mainly driven by non-mining sectors such as Transport and Communications and Trade, Hotels and Restaurants. These sectors recorded growth rates of 7.4 percent, and 7.1 percent, respectively in 2014.