“We were never consulted. So I Want to say to the civil servants your bonuses will come to you as usual”
PRESIDENT Robert Mugabe has reversed the suspension of civil servants’ bonuses saying he was not consulted when it was announced.
Finance Minister, Patrick Chinamasa announced on Monday last week that government had decided to suspend payment of bonuses to civil servants for the next two years saying the move was meant to create a fiscal space as government was failing to raise enough revenue.
Addressing crowds that braved a rainy day to commemorate Zimbabwe’s 35th Independence Day, President Mugabe said the decision was never sanctioned by cabinet as Chinamasa claimed last week.
He said government would pay the civil servants’ bonuses as usual because it was their right.
He described Chinamasa’s move as “disgusting”.
“It is disgusting to us. It was never a government policy not to pay civil servants bonuses. My Vice Presidents (Emmerson Mnangagwa and Phelekezela Mphoko) and I were shocked to hear about that. It never came to our attention. We were never consulted. So I Want to say to the civil servants your bonuses will come to you as usual,” Mugabe said.
Chinamasa was not part of the gathering as he is in the United States of America attending the International Monetary Fund ’s 2015 spring meetings which begin on Friday and end on Sunday. He hoping to use the forum to engage multilateral lending institutions to try and salvage the collapsing economy.
While this gives relief to the 530 000 strong government workforce, it would imply that government, already grappling with an acute financial crisis, will have to raise the over US$172million required to pay for the bonuses.
In his announcement last week, Chinamasa said the decision was one of the many ways in which government was seeking to contain government recurrent expenditure and to channel resources to less capital intensive and high impact revenue projects.