Opposition parties fume about R71m in bonuses for eThekwini workers

Opposition parties in eThekwini have slammed a council decision to approve R71m in performance bonuses for employees amid challenges in the city.

This after the EFF and ANC, during Tuesday's council meeting, voted in favour of a motion to reprioritise the overtime budget to pay performance incentives in salary grades three to nine.

The item was adopted when these parties' votes dwarfed those of the DA and ActionSA. The latter believe the budget should be used to address challenges facing the municipality and that workers have not done enough to warrant bonuses.

However, the ANC said the decision was strategic in the face of threatened legal action.

Zwakele Mncwango, ActionSA provincial chairperson, said: “We voted against it not because we don't want workers to be incentivised, but because of the situation we're in right now. Look at infrastructure, sanitation, water, electricity ... there's an outcry in all departments ... you can't pinpoint any unit that is functioning properly. Now how do you justify paying bonuses for performance like that?

“The bonus must be linked to the performance of the entire department. It must motivate them to continue the work they’re doing. If you award them bonuses while they’re not performing, they will never perform.”

He added that the municipality lacked a “culture of hard work” because employees were entitled to bonuses without much accountability.

“Even when they work, most of them purposely work slowly so they can get overtime. The council is spending about R25m a year on overtime alone, so that tells you the municipality has no leadership that enforces accountability.”

Thabani Mthethwa, DA eThekwini caucus leader, said: “Giving out performance bonuses will be a slap in the face for ratepayers, since their hard-earned money will not provide a return on investment, but will instead benefit the corrupt and lazy within the municipality.

“The ANC in eThekwini wants to reward itself for driving our beloved municipality into the ground.

“The city’s deteriorating infrastructure, broken street lights, clogged drainage systems, a lack of upkeep, dilapidated roads, sewage pouring into houses and the sea, and a farce of a call centre have all left a bad taste in people’s mouths.

“Prioritising employee capacity, building and equipping them with the tools they need to execute at the level the city requires, should take precedence over lavishly spending money on mediocre performance.”

IFP spokesperson Mdu Nkosi said ratepayers were unhappy with service delivery and this wouldn’t sit well with them.

“Residents feel employees are not [delivering services] ... There are contracts that have been stopped in eThekwini because of the shortage of funds, yet there is money to pay staff bonuses? This tells you there is something wrong with council,” he said.

According to council documents, the municipality's executive committee was informed that the R71m represented a settlement the municipality negotiated at the bargaining council to honour contractual obligations in these grades. It was submitted that rejecting this recommendation could lead to strikes.

ANC councillor Nkosenhle Madlala said the bonuses were owed to the workers for three years of work and the municipality would face court action if they were not paid. 

He said during and after Covid-19 the city didn’t have enough money to pay them and negotiated with unions for a break from doing so.

“Those performance bonuses are based on performance contracts the workers signed with the employer ... We agreed with unions that because of the financial state of the municipality we were not going to pay the bonuses, though they have performed,” he said.

“So we went to the bargaining council and negotiated with the unions. We [agreed to] pay the lowest-paid workers.

“You cannot blame a foot soldier for losing a war when the general's strategy didn't work. That the city is not doing well is not their fault. The management and us as political leaders should take responsibility ... [we cannot] punish the workers for those failures."

Madlala added that the deal was the best-case scenario under the circumstances as the alternative would have cost the city much more.

“For three years we haven't been paying those bonuses and now the unions are threatening to go to court to demand what is due to them. [Had they done so], they would've won because they have a contract with the employer and the employer was failing to pay."

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