Some economists consider that the new amounts of the Single Wage Scale (TSU) of the civil service, announced on Tuesday, 17 January, by the Government, show improvements and open the way for a probable sustainability in the medium and long term.
To Diário Económico (DE), economist Egas Daniel, of IGC-Mozambique and a graduate of the London School of Economics, said that the amounts did not change much in relation to what was the previous proposal published last July. However, he noted that there were significant changes in the base salary, as it now includes auxiliary staff, agents and workers.
“As far as we can see, there are significant changes in the base salary”, Egas Daniel stressed.
Egas Daniel also explained that with the new amounts, “it is likely that there will be more sustainability of the TSU, because although the minimum wage has increased by more than 100% it does not mean that all the other wages that make up the TSU have registered the same increase”.
“For all intents and purposes, the effective sustainability of the Single Wage Table can only be analysed after the audit in relation to the framing process has been carried out and the actual cost incurred to pay salaries based on the new amounts can be seen, as well as how much this will represent in terms of financial effort,” added Egas Daniel.
However, the source said that “we are heading towards sustainability, if there is no deviation or anomaly, in relation to what the Government announced this week. In this sense, one can say that we are gradually moving towards the sustainability of the TSU in the medium and long term”.
In turn, the economist and researcher at the Centre for Public Integrity (CIP), Estrela Charles, believes that the new figures show an improvement in what the minimum wage is, adding that such an improvement will put pressure on the private sector to set minimum wages at more or less the same levels as those of the civil service.
However, the economist pointed out that the new approved values still do not meet the needs of Mozambicans, due to the current crisis caused by the increase in the price of fuel, as well as goods and services.
“We are moving towards sustainability if there is no deviation or anomaly, in relation to what the Government announced this week. In this sense, it can be said that we are gradually moving towards sustainability of the TSU, in the medium and long term.”
“If 2022 was a difficult year, 2023 will be a more difficult year, so it is positive that we have this increase. But it is still below what is necessary for a Mozambican to have the minimum of a basic food basket,” said Estrela Charles.
Making a general analysis, the interviewee said that the Single Wage Scale “is a good project, it only failed at the time when it was not socialized, it did not collect contributions from civil society as well as from other sectors. It had everything to work if the political issue had not been involved in relation to the technical one. The salary scale in the civil service was announced politically, and there was no technical work to know the issue of sustainability and how the values will be paid,” detailed the source.
For the economist, the TSU could have been implemented in a phased manner to avoid upheavals.
“Mozambique is one of the only countries where the civil servant works 30 days and does not know what his salary is and where he fits in. And we have different salaries for the same civil servant which shows a disorder within the Ministry of Economy and Finance and the Government,” the source concluded.
The definitive remuneration amounts for the State employees in the scope of the TSU establish the value of 8758 meticais for the minimum salary against the previous 4689 meticais.
As well as the minimum wage, corresponding to auxiliaries, agents and workers, in the new salary scale for the Mozambican civil service a specialist rises from the current 24 882 meticais to 60 758 meticais, while a senior technician (N1) rises from 17 539 meticais to 37 758 meticais.
N2 senior technicians and professional technicians increase from 13 565 meticais to 24 358 meticais and 8 531 meticais to 17 758 meticais, respectively.
Medium technicians will increase from 7443 meticais to 14 758 meticais, while technical assistants will earn 10 758 meticais, against 5531 meticais in the previous table.
The implementation of the new TSU, adopted in the final months of last year, was strongly contested due to “non-conformities” presented by several professional classes in Mozambique, namely judges, teachers and doctors, with the latter having organised a strike to demand a review of the process.
