Speaker Rebecca Kadaga said emphasis should be put on the Ministry of Public Service. File photo
Kampala. Unjustified
wide salary and wage disparities among government employees of same
category is a looming danger to the country’s efforts to retain its best
professionals, a new report has warned.
The report by the Equal
Opportunities Commission on the status of salary disparity in the
various public institutions shows that it takes seven years for the
lowest political leader to earn what the highest political leader earns
in one year.
“A permanent secretary in the Ministry of Finance,
Planning and Economic Development or any other ministry earns 9 per cent
of what the Commissioner General of Uganda Revenue Authority (URA)
earns and 7 per cent of what the governor, Bank of Uganda earns,” reads
the report released in Kampala on Thursday.
The report adds that
the best paid officials in public institutions are receiving salaries of
between Shs30m and Shs54m per month, while the Chief Justice is paid a
paltry Shs5m a month.
The Annual Report on the State of Equal
Opportunities in Uganda 2015/16 examined Uganda’s efforts towards
eliminating discrimination and marginalisation and promoting the
attainment of access to services regardless of gender, age, race, ethnic
origin, religion or any other unjustified basis.
Highest earners
The
report reveals that out of 25 positions analysed at deputy level or its
equivalent in the various public offices or institutions, the highest
salary earners include deputy executive director at Kampala Capital City
Authority (KCCA), head of Finance at Uganda Coffee Development
Authority, deputy Inspector General of Government, deputy executive
director of Uganda National Bureau of Standards, deputy executive
director of Uganda Tourism Board, deputy director of Cotton Development
Organisation, director of Uganda Industrial Research Institute, director
of UEPB and deputy director for National Agricultural Advisory
Services.
“Like the case has been presented at the top most levels,
salary disparities trickle down to the lower-level workers. In certain
institutions, lower level workers are paid different salary scales
compared to other workers in the same entity.
Cases in point are
the teachers and medical workers in KCCA paid under the Ministry of
Public Service structure, yet their counterparts are paid under KCCA
salary structure,” reads the report.
While launching the report, the
Speaker of Parliament, Ms Rebecca Kadaga, said emphasis should be put on
the Ministry of Public Service.
“This ministry should explain how
many people with disabilities it has employed and if there is a
provisional policy that protects these people during the period of
employing them so that equal opportunity can be easily and adequately
evened to Ugandans,” she said.
Ms Kadaga also called for emphasis
on monitoring public corporations such as Bank of Uganda to show how
many people with disabilities are employed and the policy they have to
protect them. She also tasked the Equal Opportunities Commission to find
out how street vendors are handled and catered for.
“You need to
find out how many people who sell on streets are arrested and where they
go after. We are going to make a law that protects vendors because you
may find out that they carry their small capital on their heads and have
not stolen but their lives end up being ruined,” Ms Kadaga observed.
Ms
Sylvia Ntambi, the chairperson of the Equal Opportunities Commission,
explained that the report looked into salary disparities, especially in
the government institutions because of the need to harmonise pay among
civil servants.
“We want the government to complement the salary of
its servants and be put at the same level in accordance to the nature of
work and education level. For example, government should stop the
authorities from setting their own salary structures,” she said.
CREDIT: MONITOR
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