Chiredzi staff go 8 months without pay
CHIREDZI Town Council has failed to pay its workers for the past eight months, as revenue inflows continue to dip.
There are fears the local authority will soon fail to provide services since disgruntled workers are mulling a sit-in designed to press council to pay their dues.
Workers are also considering legal action unless their employer pays them at least three months salary.
Chiredzi Town chairperson Councillor Francis Moyo told participants at a meeting between council and representatives of various sectors on Thursday last week that the local authority was facing severe cash flow challenges.
“As council, we are owed more than $10 million by various organisations, and we have decided to call this meeting to discuss the way forward so that council can collect enough revenue to sustain its day-to-day operations,” he said.
“The entire council workforce, including the top management, have gone for almost eight months without salaries and they now want to take us to court unless we pay them at least three months of their outstanding salaries by December this year.”
Cllr Moyo said there was need for a collective effort to improve revenue
said she could not comment as the case was still before the courts.
Tongaat workers have been involved in a three-year labour dispute with their employer.
Workers initially went on strike in 2014 seeking a salary hike.
The strike shut down sugar operations collection to avoid a crisis.
Council’s financial position became worse after the Zimbabwe Revenue Authority (Zimra) garnished its accounts over unpaid taxes.
United Chiredzi Residents and Ratepayers’ Association secretary-general Mr Bernard Dhacha advised council to boost its revenues by finding means to recover over $9 million owed by the local business community in unpaid rates.
“Your financial statements show that residents owe you a paltry $1,3 million while the business community owes you millions of dollars that you are not keen to recover,” said Mr Dhacha.
at Triangle and Hippo Valley Estates in Chiredzi.
The industrial action was then called off after the intervention of the Ministry of Labour, Public Service and Social Welfare, which implored workers to abandon it while their grievances were being addressed.