The Zambian Government has bailed out the financially troubled Tanzania Zambia Railway Authority (Tazara) with funds to offset three months' salary arrears owed to unionised workers.
However, it was yet to be established if Tanzania had paid its Tazara workers 3.3bn/- salary and allowance arrears to its workers.
Crews Allied Workers Union of Zambia (CRAWUZ) president, Bevis Silumbe and Workers Union of Tazara (WUTAZ) general secretary, Afrika Mkandawire confirmed this in separate interviews yesterday.
The unionised workers recently threatened to stage a work stoppage following management's failure to pay them salaries for three months.
The affected workers had not received salaries for September, October and November, 2015.
Silumbe said the unions had been holding meetings with Transport and Communications Minister Kapembwa Simbao who assured them that the government would settle the workers' salary arrears.
Silumbe, who said the workers would start getting their salaries this week, also disclosed that the government had sourced funds to pay the workers their January and February, 2016 salaries.The government has in the past four years been providing financial support to Tazara for payment of its workers as the railway company has been facing numerous challenges in raising revenue from its business.
Silumbe said Tazara was expected to start operating profitably once its debt and operational challenges were addressed.
He said the railway company should be able to stand on its own and not always turn to the government for financial assistance.
In December last year the Authority said it was set to pay its workers 3.3bn/- salary and allowance arrears anytime from now as the jointly-owned railway line expects to receive funds from its sources from today.
The Tazara Regional General Manager, Fuad Abdallah, said in Dar es Salaam that the authority would until next week clear all arrears, including the June salary to all workers and January salary to some of its workers.
“Tazara expects to receive the funds between tomorrow (today) and a day after tomorrow (tomorrow)” said the Tanzania regional boss.
Abdallah explained that Tazara paid part of its staff in January after receiving the funds from the government in June that covered salaries of its all workers from February to May. “We will clear arrears for June salaries. The authority will also pay workers who did not receive the salaries in January,” he reported.
He attributed the situation to the fact that the authority was experiencing small business capital. “We should at least carry 450,000 tonnes consignment per year to accommodate operational costs’’, he pointed out.
He noted that Tazara now owned 11 locomotives with carriage capacity of 87,000 tonnes of the consignment per year. “The authority will require 29 locomotives to accommodate 450,000 tonnes of consignment per year,” he added.
Earlier, Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Transport, Dr Shaaban Mwinjaka, told journalists in Dar es Salaam that the government had cleared salary arrears for Tazara staff, adding that allowances should be met internally.
“The government had to chip in to pay the September and October salaries. But allowances should be paid by the authority itself,” said the PS.
Speaking to the media, Mussa Kalala, who is the Tanzania Railway Authority Workers’ Union (TRAWU) national chairman, appealed to Tazara management to speed up payment of arrears for salary and allowances.
“Some of our members (Tazara staff) did not receive their salaries in January while all staff did not receive their salaries in June,” said the TRAWU national chairman.
The Tazara railway, also called the Uhuru Railway or the Tanzam Railway, is a railroad in East Africa linking the port of Dar es Salaam in Tanzania with the town of Kapiri Mposhi in Zambia's Central Province.
The single-track railway is 1,860 km (1,160 mi) long and was built by the Tanzania-Zambia Railway Authority (Tazara) from 1970 to 1975 as a turnkey project financed and supported by China.
At the time of its completion, two years ahead of schedule, the Tazara was the single longest railway in sub-Saharan Africa. At the cost of US $500 million to build, the Tazara was the largest single foreign-aid project undertaken by China.
The governments of Tanzania, Zambia and China built the railway to eliminate landlocked Zambia's economic dependence on Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) and South Africa, both of which were ruled by white-minority governments. The railway provided the only route for bulk trade from Zambia's Copperbelt to reach the sea without having to transit white-ruled territories. The spirit of Pan-African socialism among the leaders of Tanzania and Zambia and the symbolism of China's support for newly independent African countries gave rise to Tazara's designation as the "Great Uhuru Railway", Uhuru being the Swahili word for Freedom.
Running some 1,860 km (1,160 mi) from Tanzania's largest city, Dar es Salaam, on the coast of the Indian Ocean to Kapiri Mposhi, near the Copperbelt of central Zambia, the Tazara is sometimes regarded as the greatest engineering effort of its kind since the Second World War. The railway crosses Tanzania in a southwest direction, leaving the coastal strip and then entering largely uninhabited areas of the vast Selous Game Reserve. The line crosses the TAN-ZAM highway at Makambako and runs parallel to the highway toward Mbeya and the Zambian border, before entering Zambia, and linking with Zambia Railways at Kapiri Mposhi.
From sea level, the railway climbs to 550 metres (1,800 feet) at Mlimba, and then reaches its highest point of 1,789.43 metres (5,870.8 feet) at Uyole in Mbeya before descending to 1,660 metres (5,450 feet) at Mwenzo, the highest point in Zambia, and settling to 1,274.63 metres (4,181.9 feet) at Kapiri Mposhi.
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN
No comments :
Post a Comment