City bureaucrats’ sky-high salaries
SIR – The public will be slightly pleased to know that the City of Cape of Town has backed down on its planned 17% salary increases for its executive directors and they will now receive only a 7.1% increase, according to the approved budget.
This means that Chief Finance Officer, for instance, will start the new municipal year with a salary package of R3 008 230 instead of the proposed R3 286 449. He will have to make ends meet on just under R274 000 a month.
So will the executive directors of corporate services, strategic governance, informal settlements, water and waste services, safety and security, social services, and the suspended commissioner of the transport and urban development authority.
The executive director of area-based service delivery (whatever that may be) will have to scrape by with a package of R2 134 998 or about R178 000 a month. So will the two executive directors for asset and facilities management and energy.
The good thing about this is that it will make negotiations with the unions a little easier. Seventeen percent was always going to be explosive and I cannot understand why an increase of this magnitude was ever considered. Did they really think we wouldn’t notice?
There is no change to the proposed salaries of the political office bearers, whose pay ranges from R1.13m to R1.45m.
These are the people who have the overall responsibility for the performance of the city and can be called to account.
Why should the bureaucrats, who are not accountable to the public, earn twice as much?
The other point is that there are far too many executive directors. It was not so long ago that the City managed very well with a Town Clerk, a City Engineer, a Treasurer, a City Electrical Engineer and a Medical Officer of Health as the top executives.
The revised increases are still above the inflation rate and that is no longer acceptable. We should start campaigning now for zero increases for public servants who already earn salaries well above market rates and enjoy watertight job security.
JANINE MYBURGH, President of the Cape Chamber of Commerce and Industry