‘Pay Us By 29/12/15 Or We Go On Strike’-Zimbabwe Nurses Association (ZINA)

We note with regret the recent sudden change of pay day through press release by the Honorable Minister of Finance.

The sudden extension of civil service pay dates to the 5th of next month is ridiculous and unbelievable.

Zimbabwe nurses association (ZINA) appreciates and  understand the difficulties faced by the government on financing its operations , but it is the lack of recognition and sincerity by the employer in addressing issues affecting health workers and consulting them on critical matters which is puzzling.

We are patriotic Zimbabweans who love our work to the core but sometimes the actions taken by the government does not only make our operations difficult but also demoralises our constituency. While it is every employee’s wish to enjoy the festive season with his or her pay in the pocket plus the 13th cheque of late we had become accustomed to get paid end of December with  bonus coming later.

However the recent sudden announcement on the shifting of our pay day has put our constituency in a very difficult situation.

Unlike other civil servants who enjoy holidays ours call that we be on duty 24/7 and history has it that pressure of work mounts during this season because of increased activities on our roads resulting in accidents and other associated health problems.

Let it be known that our meager salaries can not stretch beyond the 31st of December 2015 as we had made budgets with pay dates in mind.

Under the circumstances we would like to announce that as of 1st January we don’t have transport money to go to work which simply means that we will be home starving without even food, rentals not mentioning money for school fees.

This is regrettable because patients are the ones who will suffer due to minimum coverage by Nurses.We will only afford to go to work when we get paid.

This can only be reversed if the government makes transport arrangements for our workforce to and from work and or they pay us on the 29th of December.

This situation   has been necessitated by Government failure to pay us on the indicated day on the pay slip.

We cant afford the transport fares due to bungling by our employer. The decision to make such an announcement a week before pay day shows shear arrogance by the employer who knows pretty well that he is paying us way below the poverty datum line than what our colleagues in the region are getting. To make matters worse we are in December and no announcement has been made to when we will be paid our bonus   despite assurance by the highest office in the land the president that we will get our bonuses.

There is   no word as to when this is going to be fulfilled .Government must learn to communicate and engage critical stakeholders on matters which determine their fate.Let us engage and treat the employee with the dignity they deserve. Nurses still remain committed in serving the Zimbabwean communities.

General Secretary
MR Enock Dongo on behalf of Zimbabwe nurses associationSource: Enock Dongo