The health department in KwaZulu-Natal was left red-faced on Monday morning when a group of service providers locked its provincial headquarters in central Pietermaritzburg in a bid to force it to pay them.
The group of service providers started gathering around the offices at about 6am and locked the gates leading to the Natalia Building, the headquarters of the department led by MEC Nomagugu Simelane-Mngadi.
According to Zethembe Ngcongo, who spoke to Sunday World on behalf of the unpaid service providers, some of their members have gone for two years without being paid, yet they have already rendered services efficiently.
Ngcongo said the unpaid service providers include security companies guarding various hospitals in the province, cleaning companies, and emerging contractors that carry out maintenance work on an emergency basis.
Despite knowing that they have no reserves to hold out in the event that the government delays paying them, he claimed that they have observed a trend where the department prioritises paying large companies while excluding emerging ones.
Businesses unable to pay employees
“This department does not miss payments to cellular companies like Vodacom and MTN because they know that they would be cut off. They also pay a lot of money to Bidvest and leave out emerging companies,” said Ngcongo.
“That’s the trend right now. They also prioritise paying municipalities since they don’t want to be deprived of the services these municipalities provide to hospitals.”
He went on to say that small businesses are unable to pay their employees and meet other daily operational obligations because of the department’s non-payment.
“Some of our employees have taken us to the CCMA [Commission for Conciliation, Mediation, and Arbitration] to demand their payments; some service providers are being hunted by loan sharks with guns as they are unable to pay back loans they took to stay afloat.
“Some have lost their houses and cars to banks, and their kids have been kicked out of schools due to non-payment of school fees.”
Department promises to start making payments
After today’s dramatic shutdown of the offices, Ngcongo said the department told them it has received R1.5-billion and would soon start making payments.
Ngcongo, however, stated that they are concerned about the department’s R2-billion debt to service providers, which would leave them with an R500-million deficit.
“We fear that once again they will pay big companies first and leave emerging contractors out,” said Ngcongo.
“If that happens, we will come back again on Monday next week and close down the offices. When we do so, we will be a larger group than the one that closed the offices today.”
Sunday World has sent a list of questions to the department, but it has not responded.
