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Ghasia must apologise - TUCTA
2007-08-25 09:28:21
By Anna Mandara and Beatha Hyera, SAUT
The Dar es Salaam regional branch of the Trade Union Congress of Tanzania (TUCTA) yesterday asked the minister of state in the President`s Office responsible for Public Service Management, Hawa Ghasia, to apologize for an allegedly abusive statement she had made against workers on August 12, this year, prior to a workers’ demonstration.
TUCTA had organized a protest march to pressure the government to make substantial wage increases, an action that provoked the cabinet minister to utter remarks which downplayed the significance of the protest.
In her reaction, the minister had said: “Workers represent a small faction of the country’s population, thus cannot twist government systems.”
“Workers are not happy with the minister`s remarks. She has belittled our status. We want her to apologize,” said the Dar es Salaam regional chairman, Buhan Semvua, at a news conference in Dar es Salaam yesterday.
“She needs to apologize in order to avoid potential confrontation resulting from her mockery or else we are going to stage a march requesting the President to drop her from the cabinet list,” he added.
They similarly asked the Minister of Labour, Youth Development and Sports, Capt. John Chiligati to apologize for an akin statement he had apparently made during the demonstration.
The local press quoted the minister as accusing a small group of workers of being behind the demonstration. He was also quoted as saying he did not feel the impact of the demo because it took place on a Saturday.
“The statement itself shows clearly that the minister lacks a background of workers’ grievances. We advise him to take time to understand our complaints before uttering any statement,” said Semvua.
Low salary is the centre of the controversy pitting the government and trade unions under their TUCTA umbrella. The government had increased the minimum wage from 75,000/- to 84,000/-, but the increase was described by unionists as peanuts.
They thus resorted to demonstrate on August 11 in order to pressure the government to accept their demands.
Reacting on the demonstration, Minister Ghasia said the event would not change the government’s stance on wage levels.
“Public servants are a very small part of the society in comparison with other public demands such as hospitals, roads, schools, water and electricity,” the local press quoted the minister as saying.
She also said the government had a lot of pending development issues to deal with, and that the government could not always deal with the workers.
“We have done our best level to adjust salaries in tune with the prevailing economic situation,” said the minister.
Efforts to get the minister’s reaction yesterday proved futile as she could not pick her mobile phone.
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