NEHAWU statement on the Government Employees Housing Scheme 

17 May 2019

The National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union [NEHAWU] welcomes the work done so far by the Government Employees Housing Scheme [GEHS] Advisory Committee that was established as per the PSCBC Resolution 5 of 2017 to speed up the process of ensuring that more than 850 000 public servants are able to access their own homes through the GEHS driven scheme.

The advisory committee that consist of both labour and government has made commitment to work harder to ensure that public servants get dignity of owning their own homes through utilisation of economies of scale to deliver home finance products at prime-minus. To this effect, parties in the committee have developed a road map to fast track the process and this process means that in the next few months to come GEHS will be fully operational.

To us as a union, this is a positive step in the right direction because our members have been suffering a lot because of the financial exclusion by financial institutions in the country when applying for home loans. As NEHAWU, we hope that the incoming Minister of Public Service and Administration will not retard the progress made but will ensure that it is implemented fully for the benefit of workers.

The national union believes that owning a home brings dignity and will at all material times ensure that we fight for our member’s dignity to be restored and their financial wellbeing improved.

Issued by Khaya Xaba, Media Liaison Officer, NEHAWU, 17 May 2019