NEHAWU statement on the resolution 1 of 2018 court proceedings

2 December 2020

The National Education, Health and Allied Workers’ Union (NEHAWU) would like to report to its members and workers that the matter of the salary increase of public servants was deliberated on earlier today at the Labour Appeals Court (LAC).

Our legal team did its outmost best to prove to the court that government negotiated in bad faith in 2018 and that they are hell-bent on using workers as scapegoats for problems in the fiscus including large amounts of money lost to corruption, wasteful and fruitless expenditure. Furthermore, we argued why government must be made to honour the binding collective agreement signed in 2018 at the Public Service Co-ordinating Bargaining Council (PSCBC).

Judgement on the matter has been reserved and we will expeditiously update our members and workers as soon as the judges have handed down the judgement. The legal battle is one of many avenues that we are prepared to pursue in order to defend collective bargaining and to compel government to implement the last leg of the agreement. In this regard, we are at an advanced stage of mobilising our members to join the Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) protest action/sit-in at the Union Buildings on Friday December 4, 2020.

The struggle to defend collective bargaining will be intensified on all fronts and we will fight tooth and nail to defend the hard won gains of workers that government wants to erode. Our members and workers must remain ready for the mother of all wars against our government that has decided to treat them with sheer disdain and arrogance. The unity of workers at this current conjecture remains very sacrosanct and central in the fight against an uncaring government which does not value the effort they put in improving service delivery.

Issued by Khaya Xaba, National Spokesperson, NEHAWU, 3 December 2020