THE National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) owes its workers $55 million in unpaid salaries and this has affected morale at the struggling parastatal, acting general manager Lewis Mukwada said yesterday.
NQOBILE BHEBHE CHIEF REPORTER
Mukwada told journalists during a tour of the NRZ infrastructure by the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Transport and Infrastructural Development that workers had remained resilient despite going for months without pay.
“Certainly our staff are demotivated, but they have been very resilient (and) continue to work and they see hope in the company,” he said.
“We owe our workers $55 million. We have been paying salaries as and when our capacity improved.
“Since we dollarised in 2009, we have been paying salaries in batches of 30% and 40%.
“We have now decided to pay guaranteed salaries of 50% to the high earners and 75% for the lowest earners.
“But we are going to revise this to 60% and 85% as our capacity improves.
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“We hope to be paying full salaries soon and thereafter start dealing with outstanding salaries.”
He said NRZ pinned its hopes on the $460 million loan facility from a South African financial institution for the recapitalisation of the rail entity.
Last week, Transport minister Obert Mpofu told the National Assembly that the government was concerned about the non-payment of salaries at NRZ.
The parliamentary committee chairperson Amos Midzi (Zanu PF) said poor performance of NRZ had a negative bearing on the national economy.
He said the committee would strongly recommend the government to offer financial aid to the ailing parastatal.
“It’s important to understand that NRZ is a major player in our economy and whatever goes wrong at NRZ has a negative impact on the performance of the economy,” Midzi said.
“We have realised that NRZ needs major financial support and it is evident that they have lost scores of skilled personnel to the region because of the inability to pay competitive salaries.”
NRZ is facing the daunting task of improving its communication signals that are too old and need replacement.
Its track system is also in disarray and officials said $20 million was needed to upgrade security.
During the tour, committee members were shown huge piles of scrap metal, stripped locomotives, trolleys, wagons and coaches that have been dumped in the yard for several years.
Most of the property, which was worth thousands of dollars at the time, was first dumped at the workshop way back in 2001 when NRZ started facing serious operational challenges.
Workers said they were using obsolete machinery, which exposed them to risks.
NRZ, once the epicentre of the Southern African rail network and transport system, has been struggling with operations due to underfunding and obsolete equipment.
Meanwhile, about $50 million is needed to rerail the Bulawayo-Victoria Falls line.
