MALAWI: Malawi's judicial workers strike enters second month, cripples courts system

Record ID: 340734

  • Title: MALAWI: Malawi's judicial workers strike enters second month, cripples courts system
  • Date: 13th February 2012
  • Summary: BLANTYRE, MALAWI (FILE) (ORIGINALLY 4:3) (REUTERS-ACCESS ALL) VARIOUS OF MALAWI'S PRESIDENT BINGU WA MUTHARIKA VOTING WA MUTHARIKA AT A SWEARING IN CEREMONY
  • Embargoed: 28th February 2012 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Malawi, Malawi
  • Country: Malawi
  • Topics: Politics
  • Reuters ID: LVA4855DD0X1TR5NA6C5T5TAJTSZ
  • Story Text: Judiciary staff go on nationwide strike demanding a rise in salaries. They are also calling on the government of Bingu Wa Mutharika to address a rising cost of living and food shortage in the once maize surplus-producing country.
    A strike by judiciary workers in Malawi has entered a second month as government and judicial workers fail to reach an agreement in an ongoing salary dispute that has brought the country's court system to a standstill.
    Although the strike mainly involves junior staff, the entire Judiciary - from the Supreme Court of Appeal, the High Court, the Industrial Relations Court to the Magistrates Courts has shut down because clerks are essential to the daily operations of judges and magistrates.
    Judiciary employees are demanding the government to revise their salaries under new salary packages approved by parliament in 2006.
    But the cash-strapped Malawi government says it cannot afford the demands of striking judicial workers, as it would cost the state 1.2 billion Kwacha (7 million US Dollars) for 2000 judicial striking staffers.
    "Maybe they are just maybe buying time maybe they want to test our seriousness but really we are serious. We are not going back to work until government gives us our dues and it is not a demand it is just a reminder to government. Give us what parliament duly approved in 2006 for us, period," said Charles Muhiye Lizige, Malawi High Court Clerk.
    The government has maintained that the strike is illegal and asked the judiciary support staff to go back to work, but they say they will not return to work unless the government meets their demands.
    "The repercussions are obvious. We are not the victims. The victims are the general public who are failing to access our services during the time we have been on strike," said Austin Kamanga, Malawi High Court spokesperson said.
    The workers held a similar strike in 2008 to force the government to implement the pay increase approved by the legislature two years earlier, but the strike was cancelled three days later after government authorities promised to look into their grievances. They say they've been waiting ever since.
    Malawi's Civil Servants Trade Union (CSTU) has threatened to mobilise all civil servants in Malawi to go on strike in solidarity with their counterparts in the judiciary.
    "The problem is, when workers band up together you cannot handle them. They just go wild. You would better start treating workers fairly now or it is a doomed country," said Emmie Chanika, political and human rights activist.
    Working conditions for workers in the court system are reviewed every three years, while others in the government often receive yearly pay increases.
    Malawian president Bingu wa Mutharika has come under increasing criticism, as civil rights groups want him to explain his personal wealth, address foreign exchange and fuel shortages as well as reconcile with Britain, which froze aid after a diplomatic spat.
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