President Cyril Ramaphosa’s go-ahead for the 3.8% salary increase for ministers and deputy ministers, MPs, premiers and members of provincial legislatures was published in the government gazette on January 9.
The dent in the public wage bill for politicians is enormous but infuriatingly far from justified. South Africans have every right to be seething to hear our politicians are getting a pay hike. Every corner of our provinces has lived the inefficiency and failure of our ministries in the past year and so news that the already inflated salaries of our politicians are to be boosted is sickening.
In the corporate world, salary increases are linked to a number of indicators including inflation, with the main incentive being performance and there are consequences for a lack of performance. So it begs the question: how do you justify this increase when the void of delivery is gaping?
On Monday 14 children and their families paid in blood for the recycled promise of fixing our country’s scholar transport system when an allegedly unlicensed taxi driver crashed into a truck on their way to school in Vanderbijlpark, south of Joburg. Can the politicians answer to these grieving families?
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.