Report reveals salary disparities among similar government employees

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.

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