Some economists consider “there are no conditions” for the adoption of the single salary scale (TSU) for public agents and employees, announced this week by the Government, and recall the instability that the national economy has undergone in recent years.
To the Diário Económico (DE), João Feijó, researcher from the Observatório do Meio-Rural (OMR), reveals his “strangeness regarding what is happening in the public sector”, arguing that the announced increases obey what he calls a “political agenda, since elections are coming up”, he highlights.
And he continues: “I find it strange for two reasons: first, we are facing an IMF intervention, which generally always follows the same recipe, which is to cut public spending. So, in the context of an IMF intervention, the Government doubles the minimum wage? I find this strange, I still don’t get it. Secondly, we’ll have to wait another month to see, in practice, how it’s going to be. And if this is true and doubling it means that they’ll have to reduce other items, or increase taxes, or reduce other state expenses,” explained Feijó.
Sharing the same position, economist and researcher at the Center for Public Integrity (CIP), Estrela Charles, says she has no doubt that the measure is really a ‘political agenda’. And she adds: “the single salary scale has been designed for some years, and when the Government tries to implement it now it configures two things: the first is the issue of trying to soften the cries of the population related to the cost of living. The second concerns the moment in which the Government approves this Single Wage Table – it is the last mandate of governance and it wants to leave with the trump card that this measure has been realized. It is opportune for the Government”.
According to Estrela Charles, the Single Wage Table (TSU) will not solve much. What may happen is that a certain group will have a relatively higher salary, which will make it possible to acquire more goods and services. It will not, however, solve everyone’s problem, that is, the high cost of living.
“The big problem [of applying this measure] is sustainability. Will the government be able to maintain salaries? Because even before the implementation of the TSU, the public wage was already increasing by 10 billion meticais per year. As the situation stands at the moment, we can say that there are no financial conditions, since production is not walking according to the expected levels and that will depend a lot on the measures that the Government will adopt. It’s up to the Government to arrange the financial conditions and cut back in other areas,” explained the economist.
In turn, researcher João Feijó admits that it is difficult to understand what is actually happening, since this measure is being announced at a time when the Mozambican economy is going through instability: “the only hypothesis for this to be viable is to cut revenues, public spending on infrastructure, road maintenance, equipment, consumables and the functioning of institutions, or else increase taxes. But this will be complicated because VAT is already very high”.
Thus, João Feijó understands that the new single salary scale only concerns the public sector, because the private sector salary scale is made by sectors and is conditioned to the productivity of each one.
“Wages are made between sectors, for example, banking, which has shown more productivity, is the sector with the highest wages, and agriculture has the lowest wages. Wages in the private sector obey the logic of the market and not another. Wages in the private sector will have to increase taking into account the cost of living,” he concluded.
In his turn, economist Elcídio Bachita said he sees the implementation of the TSU with good eyes, since it will put an end to wage disparities in the public sector between different employees.
“This approval happens at a time when the economy is registering some revenge [retraction], but I see it with good eyes. I think that there are conditions to make the implementation of this table,” he stressed.
However, in terms of challenges, economist Estrela Charles says that for the country, the first major challenge has to do with transparency and communication, because the salary scale is being implemented in a very turbulent way, with little transparency and very little information.
“We are seeing that all public sector employees are not aware of what it is going to look like, how much they will receive. The Government is failing to manage expectations and this is very dangerous, because an expectation can create debt and other situations that can be damaging. The Government should, therefore, be more transparent and communicative,” he warns.
A source from the Confederation of Business Associations (CTA) preferred not to comment, claiming that this is a measure that only involves the civil service.
The amounts of the Single Wage Table (TSU) were announced on Wednesday, July 13, and it was foreseen that the measure would come into effect last Friday, July 15, having been postponed to this Thursday, July 22, in an application that will cost the State 13.5 billion meticais. The new salaries will be between 8758,00 meticais and 165 758,00 meticais, that is, the minimum wage in the State table goes up 80% in relation to the current 4688,00 meticais.
