By Bida Elly David
A Civil Society activist has cautioned the silence of politicians over deliberating on the proposal made by the Minister of Public Service towards increasing civil servants’ salaries to 20,000 South Sudanese Pounds a month.
This came following the lack of seriousness that politicians have developed amid addressing and executing the concerns of the Minister of Public Service, Joseph Bangasi Bakosoro demanding remuneration improvement to civil servants.
Recently, the Minister of Public Service made a proposal for the increment of civil servants’ salaries to 20,000 South Sudanese Pounds (SSP) as a method of remuneration support to boost service delivery but things still seem to be hanging.
Speaking to No. 1 Citizen Daily Newspaper, Edmund Yakani, the Executive Director for Community Empowerment for Progress Organisation (CEPO) said that the silence made by politicians on Bakosoro’s proposal to increase civil servant’s salary was a failure to serve the nation and only egoism.
“Honourable Minister Joseph Bakosoro proposed a 20,000-salary structure for civil servants to start jobs with and politicians are quiet of this. Bakosoro’s proposal has never been acted on by political leaders. I have not seen deliberations and reactions around it and the proposal of Bakosoro is dying silently. I don’t want to see the silence of the political leaders telling us that there is no revenue. If we are to do comparative analysis, civil servants are asked to start their salary structure with 20,000 SSP per month and politicians starting with 800,000 SSP” Yakani said
Furthermore, Yakani said that the claimed commitments raised by politicians towards working on the proposal for the salary structure were rubber stamp ideas and lame.
He added that people’s standards of living would not be improved by making political statements but rather practical implementation of decisions.
“Politicians were not able to agree to increase civil servants’ salary. They are silent completely at the level of the parliament committee. Nobody wanted to raise the proposal of Joseph Bangasi Bakosoro. I feel disturbed by this silence of politicians on the improvement of the salary structure of the civil servants and I don’t believe in political statements made by some politicians that we are watching the situation of the civil servants to improve their living conditions” he said.
“You cannot improve the living standards of citizens by making political statements. Living conditions of the civil servants can be improved by making practical actions like what Bakosoro has done, taking to Council of Ministers and bringing it back to the parliament and immediately executed so that civil servants will get. This is because Bakosoro is proactive in improving the salary structure of civil servants and also retirement of the old people since the politicians are not interested in those proposals.” Yakani added.
Yakani echoed that the suffering of civil servants was due to lack of political will to improve and prioritise their living standard for betterment.
However, he had urged the leadership of the parliament to deliberate on the remuneration improvement for civil servants in order to boost high morals on service delivery in the country.
“I call on the leadership of the parliament at the capacity of the speakership and members that the parliament should deliberate on the improvement of the civil servant’s salary structure. Civil servants don’t suffer due to lack of revenues but due to lack of political will to improve their living standards. We have enough money but we need a political will and commitment to improve the living condition of civil servants.”
“For me, politicians delay salaries of civil servants but they don’t delay their benefits through political defence that have been paid for by the treasury of the country. Civil servants don’t have political events for the treasury of the country. The politicians are getting money from the treasury of the country for political activities which civil servants who are providing services do not have access to; national revenues the way politicians do. You cannot improve social service delivery if you don’t improve the living standard of the civil servants” he said.