The backpay bluff

The ten per cent increase was supposed to be the Government’s flagship promise to public servants, a guarantee of relief. It was the centrepiece of their election campaign, the headline they repeated at every opportunity and the reassurance given to thousands of families. But now, as the bill comes due, what is emerging is not responsibility, not transparency and certainly not respect, what we are seeing is a Minister of Finance backpedalling from his own government’s promise, a CPO taking instructions that shift by the day and 25,000 public servants discovering that although a cash advance may arrive before Christmas, the bulk of their backpay might not be cash at all.

Let’s take this step by step, so the public can see the full picture for themselves. First came the ten per cent promise. It was made loudly and confidently on the campaign trail. The message was simple, under a new UNC administration, public servants would finally see relief. And after the PSA and CPO signed off on the increase on Tuesday morning, there was a moment where workers believed that promise was finally being honoured.

Then the contradictions began. Within hours, reports emerged that while a $500 million advance would be paid in cash before December 23, the remainder of the $3.8 billion backpay might not be cash at all. The Government, we were told, was considering “non-cash options.” And just as quickly as the confusion surfaced, the CPO confirmed it, non-cash items “must form part of the payout,” a position he says reflects the directives of Finance Minister Dave Tancoo.

The PSA president, Felisha Thomas, made her mandate clear, her members want cash. Only cash. On Wednesday, when asked directly whether the PSA may need to accept non-cash payments, the Finance Minister answer was one word, “Confirmed.”

What was once a firm promise has now become a reluctant admission. But instead of clarifying the Government’s position, Minister Tancoo has done the opposite. He insists that the negotiations are still ongoing and that “there will be a cash payment, while other details are determined.” Which details? He will not say. What non-cash options are on the table? No comment. What will 25,000 workers actually receive? Silence.

The PSA president says she has not had a single conversation with the Minister of Finance, not one. Everything has been filtered through the CPO, who himself refuses to explain what the Government is proposing.

And now, in an attempt to justify the sudden shift from “ten per cent cash” to “cash plus whatever else we decide,” the Minister of Finance is trying a new narrative, that when the UNC entered office, it found an economy “on the brink of collapse.”

This raises the most obvious question of all, if the economy was truly on the brink of collapse, why did the Government promise a ten per cent increase it could not fully deliver?

They sat in Opposition for almost ten years. They debated every budget, every fiscal decision, every loan, every expenditure. Are we now expected to believe that after a decade of loudly diagnosing the country’s economic problems, the new Government only discovered the “true state of the economy” after winning the election? That they were unaware of the very finances they spent ten years analysing? It is either the most remarkable oversight in political history, or it is an excuse, one designed to soften the backlash when workers realise they are not getting what was promised.

A government cannot campaign on generosity and govern on excuses. Public servants have heard every variation of “we don’t have money” for more than a decade. Yet somehow, money appears for everything else, from urgent spending to sudden allocations to high-profile projects, except the workers who keep this country operational every single day.

So where does that leave workers? Confused, frustrated and once again left in the middle of a tug-of-war between political convenience and economic reality. A decade of waiting has turned into a December of uncertainty.

That is why wage negotiations of this size must not remain behind closed doors. No more backroom deals. No more contradictory statements. No more selective leaks. Let the nation hear the Minister say exactly what he is offering. Let the workers hear precisely what is on the table. Let the public see who is negotiating honestly and who is playing for time.

Workers are tired of the games, tired of the contradictions and tired of being the last priority. A promise was made. Now the Government is trying to bargain its way out of it. If the Minister of Finance intends to break that promise, he should have the courage to stand before the nation and admit it, because the only thing worse than failing to deliver is pretending you ever intended to.