CSTU gives Malawi govt seven-day ultimatum to increase civil servants’ salaries

BLANTYRE-(MaraviPost)—Tonses Alliance government has been given a seven-day ultimatum to increase civil servants’ salaries or else risk a countrywide strike.

In an interview with local media, Mabvuto Kaonga, general secretary for Civil Servants Trade Union (CSTU) said leaders of the union met the government negotiating team two days before the 2021/22 national budget was passed and government agreed to raise their salaries.

However, Kaonga said government is yet to implement the increment through the issuance of a salary circular.

 Kaonga has, therefore, threatened that CSTU will call for an industrial action if government will not implement the increment within the given seven days.

When presenting the 2021/22 national budge, the finance minister Felix Mlusu did not mention anything to with civil servants’ perks increase.

According to the budget, the civil service was allocated money only for wages, infrastructure development, salary rationalization and recruitment of new workers in different government departments.

Maneno Chimulala

I am a journalist, educator, and activist with passion for telling stories about social justice, sports and political issues. I graduated from Mzuzu University. I started my career at the Maravi Post online publication in 2012 as an intern while in college. Upon graduating from Mzuzu University I was offered a job as Sports Reporter because of my background as a goalkeeper and rose to the position of sub editor. I also had a short stint with Nyasatimes, Malawi Punch and Malawi Digest. Over the past seven years, I have worked intimately with rural organizations and communities in Malawi on human rights, girl child education and grassroots development projects. With an academic background in education, I also volunteer as male champion for girls’ education under Girls Empowerment Networks (GENET) in Malawi’s South West Education Division (SWED).