ANC staffers face tough long weekend as party fails to pay salaries again

ANC staffers will have to wait a while longer for their salaries as the governing party’s inability to pay its employees continues.

Outstanding salaries

In a letter, ANC general manager Febe Potgieter-Gqubule informed staff the party would not pay their salaries for September, in addition to the outstanding salaries for July and August.

“This is to indicate that we are not yet in a position to pay outstanding salaries for July and August 2021. Unfortunately, September 2021 salaries, due on the 25th of this month, are also delayed,” Potgieter-Gqubule said.

She added that the ANC has been scrambling to raise money for the elections, with the country set to go to the polls on 1 November.

“We are in a challenging position where we have to also raise resources for local government elections, and budgets for elections have been reduced to an absolute minimum,” the statement concluded.

This is despite ANC staff committee chairperson Mvusi Mdala recently telling City Press the party had started paying the July salaries.

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Mdala said ANC staffers would go back to work if they were all paid.

The Citizen reached out to ANC spokesperson Pule Mabe, but he did not provide any clarity on the salary delays, instead insisting on discussing the upcoming local government elections.

The matter comes after ANC head of elections Fikile Mbalula on Wednesday defended the party against questions about their inability to pay staff salaries for three months while still apparently planning to spend “around R50 million” on campaigning.

Mbalula said ANC staffers protesting over unpaid salaries weren’t “real people who work at the ANC”, but “those who don’t know even their job description”, “ghost workers” and those who thought it is “fashionable for going out and embarrassing the ANC and bringing its name in disrepute”.

Charges

Last week, uMkhonto weSizwe Military Veterans’ Association (MKMVA) spokesperson Carl Niehaus laid criminal charges against the top brass of the ANC, excluding suspended secretary-general Ace Magashule, along with the party itself.

Niehaus, who was recently fired from the ANC, laid charges of fraud, theft and corruption at the Johannesburg Central Police Station last Wednesday against five of the ANC’s top-six officials.

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Further charges laid by Niehaus related to contravention of pay-as-you-earn regulations, Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) rules, the Pension Fund Act and the Tax Administration Act with regards to the party’s staffers.

The staff members had initially planned on taking legal action against the governing party’s leadership over the matter.

However, they backtracked on this move.

Additional reporting by Earl Coetzee