Civil servants end strike before OAU summit

Civil servants ended a six-week strike on Monday after the government agreed to hefty pay rises to avert a stand-off during an Organisation of African Unity (OAU) summit in Lusaka next week, Reuters has reported. Nearly 150,000 public sector employees, including teachers, local council and court employees, would receive pay hikes ranging from 81 to 91 percent in terms of the agreement, the report said. “The strike has been called off with immediate effect,” Civil Servants’ Union leader Leonard Hikaumba was quoted saying. Hikaumba, however, also warned the government not to renege on its agreement after the OAU summit, which begins with a ministerial session on 7 July. The heads of state converge on the Zambian capital on 9 July. The unions had demanded salary increases of between 100 and 250 percent, but union leaders said they would probably call for further adjustments later in the year. Zambia was one of the poorest countries in the world and civil service salaries averaged between US $50 and US $71 a month, the report said. An average monthly bill for water and electricity is US $60, it added. The strike had hit public services hard, with hospitals manned by skeleton staff, court cases postponed and teachers staying away from schools. Senior OAU officials were quoted in the report saying that they had urged Zambian President Frederick Chiluba to resolve the strike because it posed a security threat to the summit.