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NEHAWU in Limpopo is totally disgusted with the growing stubbornness of the Limpopo provincial government towards resolving long standing grievances of workers which some of them date back to 2011. Many promises have been made by government on several occasions but they are never fulfilled. NEHAWU has thus issued an ultimatum to government in particular the premier's office to resolve all these challenges with immediate effect which among others include the following:

•   Total scrapping of unfair rental fees which is equivalent to housing allowance and scrapping of all accumulated arrears.
•   Finalisation of parking bay policy.
•   Finalisation of PMDS without utilizing without discrimination backdated from 2011 with immediate effect and must be implemented uniformly.
•   Resolve once and for all challenges relating to training of nurses.
•   Re-In source back all security services, laundries, kitchens.
•   Release all outstanding investigations in several hospitals and implement their recommendations.
•   Finalise and implement the recommendations of the investigations in Public works.

Furthermore, we are furious at the introduction of the Limpopo Personnel Management Framework which has literally put all departments in some form of administration by centralizing all powers to appoint in the treasury's office. This is done in an endeavor to reduce the total cost of employee compensation at the risk of compromising service delivery and workers are compelled to do multiple tasks that are meant for more than one employee.

Workers in Limpopo will not sit down and watch this neo-liberal policy stance by our government which will turn public servants into slaves.

We also want to give a stern warning to the department of social development to resolve all problems affecting social workers immediately as agreed to in the social workers indaba or face the wrath of workers. Workers have had enough of the empty promises from this department and their patience has run out.

The union is also aware of a circular from the department which seeks to intimidate our members from engaging in an industrial action. This can only work to further stir up the emotions of workers and workers remain resolute in their course of action.

In light of the above named grievances NEHAWU will commence with lunch hour picketing, marches, workers will only do work according to their job description (work to rule) culminating in the total shutdown of the entire public service and Parastatals. It is time that workers must fight back in order to defend their interest and the interest of the people of Limpopo. People at the helm of government have become too comfortable in their seats concentrating on servicing themselves and not the people.

If these demands remain unresolved workers will be forced to identify and uproot all rotten elements in government that are impediments to service delivery and continue to undermine workers in the province.

We further call on all our branches across the province to follow internal processes and convene BGMs and mobilize workers for this campaign. We are also in consultation with other public service unions in order to plan in advance the inevitable shutdown if our demands are not met. "Limpopo is surely not the land of milk and honey for workers."

Issued by NEHAWU