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Government servants call off strike plan after Rs. 5 K allowance

04 Jan 2022

  • Say ‘temp relief’ accepted but will monitor implementation
BY Buddhika Samaraweera The Sri Lanka Government Officers’ Trade Union Association (SLGOTUA), which recently warned that they would launch a series of long-term trade union actions this month in protest over the Government’s failure to increase the public servants salaries as a solution to the rising cost of living, will not engage in the said trade union actions since the Government has decided to award a Rs. 5,000 special allowance to all public sector employees, The Morning learnt. When contacted by The Morning yesterday (4), SLGOTUA National Organiser B.A.P. Basnayake said that they have decided to suspend the series of trade union actions scheduled for this month as the Government has decided to pay a special allowance of Rs. 5,000 to all public servants. “Rs. 5,000 is not really enough when considering the current cost of living, but we are ready to accept it as a temporary relief in the current economic climate. In particular, if salaries are to be increased, a lengthy process must be followed. In doing so, salary anomalies in certain sectors will have to be addressed. Given all such issues that may arise, we have decided to accept this allowance as a temporary relief,” he added. However, he further added that the SLGOTUA would be monitoring whether these decisions will be implemented as announced by the Government and that if not, trade union actions would be launched in the future. Following warnings of trade union actions by a number of trade unions including those within the SLGOTUA, the Cabinet of Ministers, on Monday (3), decided to award a Rs. 5,000 special allowance to all public sector employees from January 2022. The announcement was made by Finance Minister Basil Rajapaksa at a media briefing. On 29 December 2021, Basnayake told The Morning that despite numerous letters to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa, Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa, and Basil Rajapaksa requesting an increase in the salaries of public servants at least by Rs. 18,000 through the Budget proposal for 2022, the Government had thus far failed to respond positively to their request. “By now, the prices of all goods and services have gone up. We therefore called for an increase in the salaries of public servants in line with the rising cost of living. We will wait until the end of December to see if the Government will give us a positive response. If not, we have already decided to launch a series of long-term trade union actions in January 2022,” he noted. Basnayake further said that the first of the said series of trade union actions would be a week-long strike action which would be supported by the SLGOTUA members belonging to several government institutions. He warned that if the Government would not provide them with a solution to the salary issue even after the week long strike, a continuous strike action will be launched in January itself. More than 700,000 state sector employees attached to the SLGOTUA were engaged in a one-day strike early December 2021, claiming that the Government had not responded to their request to increase the salaries of public servants as a remedy to the rising cost of living.

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