Chinamasa all out to eliminate ghost workers to contain wage bill

Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa, who is all out to get a financial bail-out for the country by next year, says the government will keep its 2015 wage-bill below budget projections and has started by getting rid of ghost workers.

According to The Herald Chinamasa said this in a letter to the International Monetary Fund, the world’s banker, whose backing opens doors for funding from other international financial institutions.

Zimbabwe has promised to clear its arrears to the IMF, the World Bank and the African Development Bank by the end of April next year.

Its arrears to the IMF is only $110 million while that to the World Bank is $1.15 billion and AfDB, $601 million.

The country’s wage bill consumers more than 80 percent of the budget.

Chinamasa says the government has agreed that this must be reduced to 40 percent within the next few years.

“We will keep the 2015 employment costs below budget projections. Cabinet is currently considering the report by the Civil Service Commission (CSC), containing proposals to streamline public sector employment. In line with the recently completed audit of the civil service, we have started to eliminate duplications and redundancies,” Chinamasa said.

He also said the government was working on improving its revenue collection to improve its capacity to service its debt and deliver better services.

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