SAMWU Rejects Treasury Interference and DA Attempts to Reverse Workers’ Gains in Johannesburg
6 May 2026
SAMWU Rejects Treasury Interference and DA Attempts to Reverse Workers’ Gains in Johannesburg
The South African Municipal Workers’ Union (SAMWU) notes with serious concern the recent intervention by National Treasury regarding the implementation of the Politically Facilitated Agreement (PFA) concluded between the City of Johannesburg and SAMWU. The union rejects both the substance and political posture underpinning this intervention, which amounts to a dangerous encroachment into collective bargaining and municipal labour relations.
The PFA is not an illegal agreement as some would now want the public to believe. It is the outcome of a long process of engagement aimed at addressing historical wage disparities suffered by workers in the City of Johannesburg over many years. Workers did not arrive at this point overnight. They pursued every available institutional avenue, engaged in negotiations and demonstrated patience while waiting for justice and fairness to prevail.
National Treasury must understand that the PFA remains valid and binding. In terms of our constitutional and legal framework, only a court of law can set aside a legally concluded agreement. Treasury therefore has no authority to unilaterally declare the agreement unlawful and instruct the City not to proceed with implementation. Such conduct amounts to unlawful interference in collective bargaining and undermines established labour relations processes.
SAMWU further finds it deeply suspicious that National Treasury chose to remain silent when the Democratic Alliance approached the courts in an attempt to interdict the implementation of the agreement, only to emerge now advancing the very same arguments that were rejected in court. Workers are justified in asking serious questions about whether Treasury is now doing political favours for its allies in the DA after the DA suffered defeat both politically and legally.
Having failed in Council and failed in court, the DA now seeks to govern Johannesburg through Treasury directives. The DA’s celebration of Treasury’s intervention confirms that its real objective has always been to reverse gains won by workers through struggle and collective bargaining.
This development exposes the growing alignment between sections within Treasury and political forces that have consistently opposed workers’ gains in municipalities such as Tshwane and Johannesburg. Workers must not be deceived into believing that these attacks are merely about financial discipline or governance concerns. At the centre of this campaign is an attempt to weaken collective bargaining, undermine organised labour and roll back gains won through decades of worker struggle.
SAMWU rejects the narrative that workers’ gains are incompatible with service delivery. Municipal workers are themselves the backbone of service delivery. They are the workers who maintain water infrastructure, keep cities clean, ensure electricity distribution and sustain municipal operations under increasingly difficult conditions. It is dishonest for political parties and state institutions to suddenly invoke austerity and fiscal discipline only when workers stand to benefit, while remaining silent on corruption, outsourcing, consultant expenditure and wasteful spending that continue to cripple municipalities.
At the recently concluded 13th National Congress of SAMWU, delegates resolved that workers would resist all attempts to undermine collective bargaining and that unresolved issues affecting workers would increasingly be confronted through mass mobilisation and struggle. The recent mobilisation of thousands of workers during the Johannesburg court process demonstrated exactly what Congress meant.
This renewed attack on workers by both the Democratic Alliance and National Treasury has only served to rejuvenate workers’ determination to intensify the struggle in defence of their hard-won gains.
We will organise; We will mobilise; We will fight!
SAMWU rejects this emerging alliance between the DA and National Treasury, which seeks to undermine collective bargaining and reverse gains won by workers through years of struggle. This alliance will never see the light of day without being exposed for what it truly is: an anti-worker agenda aimed at weakening organised labour and rolling back workers’ rights. Workers must reject it.
As resolved at the 13th National Congress of SAMWU, workers do not negotiate with National Treasury. Treasury has increasingly sought to interfere in collective bargaining processes and municipal labour relations, despite not being a party to these negotiations. We have seen these forms of interference before and SAMWU will not allow them to continue unchecked.
SAMWU also condemns the conduct of the Democratic Alliance, which today rushed to convene what can only be described as a political circus disguised as a media briefing in celebration of Treasury’s letter. The speed and enthusiasm with which the DA welcomed Treasury’s intervention raises serious concerns and reinforces workers’ suspicions that the DA may have known about the contents of this letter even before the City itself was formally engaged.
Workers are no longer prepared to quietly accept delays, reversals and interference in agreements that directly affect their livelihoods and families.
The union calls on the City of Johannesburg to remain firm and proceed with the implementation of the PFA without retreat or delay. Workers have waited long enough and there can be no justification for any attempt to reverse commitments already made.
SAMWU Gauteng will not fold its arms while workers’ gains are under attack and will continue to defend the interests of municipal workers at all material times.
Issued by SAMWU Gauteng Province
Mpho Tladinyane,
Provincial Secretary,
(083 941 5888)
Or
Julia Phakula
Deputy Provincial Secretary
(083 717 0898)