Equity Bank Staff Resume Duty As Management Works On Their Demands

This article was last updated on May 25, 2022

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Last week, Michael Nhial said that the national staff have been enduring for long and yet the challenges keep piling up.

“Comparing the Equity Bank grading, they pay us 1,500 South Sudanese Pounds minus deductions. This reduces to 1,200 SSP, we requested the bank to increase it but nothing has been done,” Nhial said.

“These we have requested the management to reduce it from 8:00- 5:00pm as required by the standards and the rest accumulated as overtime,” he said.

Among the issues raised was the need for a salary increment for all the staff to meet the high cost of living in South Sudan, reduction in working hours, the need to consider promotion of local staff, transport and many other demands.

“Nationals are not promoted to the higher positions and those that were done are without increment of pay in most cases,” said Nhial.

The complains included the grading of staff at all level, difference in treatment of nationals staff and foreign staff, lack of access to dollars, and lack of allocation for medical allowances.

However, the Equity Bank Managing Director, Paul Gitahi told the striking Staffs in South Sudan Hotel, that nobody will be victimized.

“I am aware that last year the Ministry of Labour issued a circular requesting for national staff to be given their rights, and these we have started immediately with the pension scheme which affected all of us,” said Gitahi.

“We should recognize the fact that we are entrusted public funds, so it is in our interest to make sure that the public access the services normally. It is in good faith that we should be able to address these issues. If you go to Equity Bilpam, Bor, Torit, Kajo-Keji, Nimule and Yambio, 99% of the managers are national staff,” he said.
He requested for the staff to resume work and appealed for 30 days to come up with a comprehensive solution to address and solve this problem once and for all.

The Director General for Labour and Industrial Relations, Clement Philemon urged the staff to resume work as a committee comprising of officials from the Ministry of Labour, Central Bank and the Equity Bank will look at the Bank’s policy and advice on some of the requirements to harmonize working relations between the bank and the staff.

“We realized that the issues raised by the staff are purely administrative, and the Ministry is concern. We are looking forward further discussion with the Bank Management,” said Philemon.

The strike last week left customers stranded without access to services.

Equity Bank Limited – South Sudan started its operations in May 2009, as part of the larger Equity Bank Group.

The Subsidiary is registered as a commercial bank through the Central Bank of South Sudan.

The Bank has its Head Office located in Juba, with 8 other branches located in major towns and still expanding.