Johannesburg – The ANC in Mpumalanga has launched a scathing attack on Luthuli House, the party’s headquaters over the crisis to pay staff salaries.
This came as it emerged that the ruling party’s financial situation is so dire, that the organisation’s provincial offices have now been forced to chip in to pay staff salaries.
Sunday World has it on good authority that Luthuli House had to resort to asking for “bailouts” from provinces due to the cash crunch that is plaguing the organisation.
The governing party has been struggling to pay workers over the last few months and has on numerous occasions not been able to pay workers on time.
This week, the organisation’s staff members again downed tools to demand that their salaries be paid.
The salary bill of workers in provincial offices, who are normally paid by Luthuli House, is now being footed by the provinces. ANC Mpumalanga secretary Lindiwe Ntshalintshali said the national office should get its house in order, noting that in the recent months, the provincial office has had to contribute to pay staff at Luthuli House. Ntshalintshali came out guns blazing, saying there are workers who have had their homes and vehicles repossessed because of the ANC’s failure to pay salaries.
“This situation cannot be allowed to go on. What kind of ANC is this that fails to pay its workers? We have already told the national office that they cannot behave like this. In fact, they have been requesting us to bail them out. For the past six months, we have been assisting in payment of salaries,” she said.
Eastern Cape ANC spokesperson Loyiso Magqashela said the only people affected are the provincial secretary and regional secretaries, who are paid directly from the Luthuli House payroll. “As for other staff members such as the office manager and other support staff personnel, we have been able to take care of them without any problem. So, their salaries are regularly paid by the province as and whenever they are due.”
KwaZulu-Natal ANC spokesperson Nhlakanipho Ntombela didn’t want to be drawn into the salary debacle. He referred Sunday World to provincial secretary Mdumiseni Ntuli, who did not respond to questions sent to him.
It has now emerged that ANC staffers in eight provinces were being paid by their provincial structures since last month. A source in the office of ANC treasurer-general (TG) Paul Mashatile, who did not want to be named for fear of reprisals, told Sunday World that the monthly salary bill was estimated to be R9-million.
However, the salary bill has now reduced by about R2.5-million after the provinces decided to take over the responsibility of salary payments.
“TG [Mashatile] still has to raise the money, but it is difficult because Covid-19 has made companies to also be careful on their donations programmes. Yes, we are struggling, but we are also working hard to get the money,” he said.
The insider said there are also duplications on the party’s payroll, and they cannot do anything about them because people have full-time employment contracts.
“Some do nothing. I must say that we are happy that the provinces have agreed to take over the salaries of their workers. As we speak, the provinces have been paid,” the source said. However, he could not confirm whether the salaries were backdated.
“The other challenges that Mashatile or any TG faces is that some ministers, when not reappointed to cabinet, usually go to work at head office and occupy senior positions … and they get paid huge salaries. The ANC can’t sustain that,” the source said.
Sunday World has been told that the Western Cape salary bill is R397 000 monthly, Gauteng about R300 000, Eastern Cape is about R335 000, and KwaZulu-Natal about R500 000. Luthuli House has about 249 staff members drawn from the party’s allied organisations including the SA Students Congress, Congress of SA Students, Umkhonto We Sizwe Military Veterans Association, and the veterans, youth and women’s leagues.
The party has also been battling to pay service providers. Sunday World reported last week that global research company Ipsos, which plays a critical role in the party’s election machinery by gauging the views of voters, pulled the plug on the governing party due to an unpaid bill of R5.8-million.
On Saturday, the ANC confirmed that it had agreed with provinces to pick up the salary tap in their respective provinces.
The party also denied a circulating statement that made claims that a group of businesspeople had donated to the organisation.
“We view these fake news as designed to further confusion on the matter of staff salaries. We want to assure everybody that our challenges will be resolved on a number of initiatives approved by national official. These include crowdfunding, increasing membership fees and levies,” party spokesperson Pule Mabe said. “We have already agreed with the provinces to take over the salary bill in provinces and this came into effect in the past two months.
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