Civil servants want first preference in sale of houses
MANZINI – As government will be selling 15 houses in the upcoming weeks, civil servants want to be given first priority.
The Minister of Finance, Neal Rijkenberg, last week during a Senate sitting, said government would soon be disposing 15 of its houses as they were a drain to government coffers.
Rijkenberg’s submission is subsequent to his maiden budget speech, wherein he articulated that government would be selling its houses to generate revenue.
In light of this development, Deputy Secretary General (DSG) of the National Public Service and Allied Workers Union (NAPSAWU), Thabile Zwane, said they were anticipating that the sale of government houses would be deliberated in the joint negotiation forum (JNF), as it formed part of the terms and conditions of service.
Zwane said they were not against the sale of the houses but had anticipated that it would be negotiated so that there would be clear guidelines on how they would be sold.
Absolve
This, she said, would absolve the process of any prospects of corruption as the processes to be engaged on would be clear. She further highlighted that there was a need for proper articulation on how civil servants would be compensated as they were in need of the houses.
“We need to know if government will offer us a housing allowance at a commercial rate,” she said.
Zwane said it would be unfortunate if government would continue to offer the current rate. It is worth noting that Public Sector Unions (PSUs) of Swaziland have been advocating for the implementation of the recommendations which were made by LLC Consultant in the 2016 salary review exercise.
The recommendation which was made in 2016 was that civil servants housing allowance should be improved from E600 to E800 for the highest paid civil servant at the same time as the subsequent lowest paid should be compensated with E1 200.
The PSUs have said the middle income earners in the civil service who ranked from Grade C 3 should be afforded E3 200, while the highest paid should be compensated with E4 000.
Meanwhile, junior civil servants also said they would appreciate being considered for the houses, as they were the ones who needed them the most compared to senior government employees.
The civil servants raised a concern that they should not be left out from being the first in buying the houses as they needed to reside within six kilometres of their duty stations. They said this was hard for those who were stationed in rural areas.
It is worth noting that the Government Standing Orders Amendment No. A115, Section 1 (A700) (1) states that all officers shall be entitled to be considered for the provision of government housing as and when it becomes available, but preference shall be given to the officer falling within one of the following categories of staff for whom special consideration shall apply because of the nature of their duties, or the terms of their employment.
They further state that rural development staff, namely staff who are required to work in remote areas where there is no alternative source of housing or accommodation available.
On the other hand, when the minister of Finance was sought for clarity and the progress of the sale of government houses, he said: “The relevant ministries are still engaged in the evaluation processes and once everything is done, government procedures would ensue.”
On the issue on how the civil servants would be compensated, Rijkenberg said the Ministry of Public Service would advise government on the next step. He could not commit on how much the houses would retail at, as he said the evaluation process was still ongoing.
It is worth noting that an audit of the housing pool was conducted by deceased Minister of Public Service Chiristian Ntshangase in 2019. In fact, in 2009, the Ministry of Public Works and Transport assigned consultants to engage in a study that reviewed the costs related to the provision and maintenance of the housing benefit to civil servants, approximated to be E30 million per year calculated by adding the cost of maintenance, leased houses and municipality rates.
The study, at the time, relayed that government was experiencing a shortfall of close to E79 million per year in maintaining housing benefits for civil servants. The study reportedly reflected that this amount excluded the cost of rehabilitation and capital projects.
Prime
In seeking to establish the state of the government houses in the city of Manzini, this publication’s reporter noted two houses located in prime land.
One of the houses is located next to the International Tabernacle Church. This particular house is hard to see as it is hidden by the thicket around it which harbours criminals.
This was a three-bedroom house, but it has since been dilapidated and vandalised, such that all copper wiring for the supply of energy and electricity was stolen.
It is not the only house that has been left vacant and abandoned, as another house was found Umbandzeni Street next to the Swazi Mills. The house was located in a plot with overgrown vegetation.
In a previous interview, the Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Public Service, Sipho Tsabedze, was sought to estabBoard lish whether government had engaged on selling the houses in their current state as the plots they were constructed in retailed at a high amount, Tsabedze said: “We engaged on it but we are yet to conclude on whether to pursue that option.”
He emphasised that government was looking at all possible options and shall decide based on what would bring in great value.
The PS could not stipulate the precise timeframe set to conclude this exercise, save to acknowledge that the exercise had dragged for long.
Tsabedze said it was urgent that this issue was resolved and anticipated that it would be done before the end of the upcoming financial year.
Meanwhile, the report of the study conducted by the Ministry of Public Works and Transport in 2009 revealed that the housing policy guiding the allocation of housing to civil servants, terms this benefit as temporary.
Discrepancies
It further relayed that the housing of civil servants in government pool houses presented social discrepancies as there were only 1 269 pool houses to be distributed among approximately 44 000 civil servants.
The implementation of the sale was expected to be staggered over a period of six months, although it was government’s policy to sell all its properties by public auction, the consultants conducting the study recommended that it was necessary for the government to waiver this policy for the sale of the pool houses as a way of mitigating the social and economic impacts to current pool houses occupants.
The consultants had also recommended a structured approach for selling the government pool houses such that the structures and the land on which they were built needed to be evaluated first before they were sold so that a market price and a reserve price could be established.