Chanco strike to go ahead over University of Malawi pay disparity

Chancellor College Academic Staff Union (Ccasu) has vowed to proceed with their planned strike over pay disparity among University of Malawi (Unima) constituent colleges.

Lecturers at Chanco, a constituent college of Unima alongside their colleagues at The Polytechnic, Kamuzu College of Nursing (KCN) and the College of Medicine (CoM), want Unima to resolve salary disparities among staff in similar grades in the four colleges as they are protesting the fact that some staff at the College of Medicine (CoM) get about 40 percent extra pay compared to their colleagues in similar grades at Unima’s other constituent colleges.

But Unima registrar Benedicto Okomaatani Malunga justifies the arrangement, arguing it has been in existence since 1991 when College of Medicine was established by Professor John Chimphangwi.

Malunga quashed what Ccasu president Anthony Gunde described as an “apartheid” system where some staff within the same Unima are getting different pay from the same employer for doing the same work.

“What kind of apartheid is this when some people work in the night teaching and training students and attending to patients when the rest of us are at home sleeping?” wondered Malunga.

Malunga explains that lecturers at CoM “go an extra mile to render clinical services in the hospital as doctors on duty who have their salary topped up by 40%.”

He accused the academic staff of neglecting the conciliation report produced by private practice lawyer Modecai Msiska dated February 22 2017 which has recommendations including that the university should declare its commitment to the single salary structure, among others.

Education activist Benedicto Kondowe said government should consider the issue of salary harmonisation, emphasising that failure to do so will lead to complications within the system.