President Thabo Mbeki has rejected the Moseneke commission’s recommendations that government leaders’ salaries be increased by huge percentages, Public Service Minister Geraldine Fraser-Moleketi said on Wednesday.
Briefing the media after Cabinet’s fortnightly meeting, Fraser-Moleketi said the new salaries, as recommended by the commission, would not be implemented.
”The president has considered the recommendations but did not accept them,” she said.
She said Mbeki would first have to officially write back to the commission informing it of his decision before making an official statement to the effect that he has rejected them.
The commission had recommended that Mbeki, his Cabinet and other public office bearers receive salary increases of up to 57%.
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) has used the recommendations as a rallying point in its current public-service strike, saying its 12% salary increase demand was nothing compared to what Cabinet ministers would soon receive.
However, Fraser-Moleketi said it was wrong for Cosatu to try and link the current wage negotiations to the commission’s recommendations.
”There is no link and there should not be any link between the recommendations that Deputy Chief Justice Moseneke has made and the current wage dispute,” she said. — Sapa