‘They fail us year in and year out’: Why community health workers are ditching unions

In South Africa, trade unions have a reputation for having workers’ backs. But for many community health workers, these organisations are no longer an ally.

Community health workers (CHWs) say they’ve “lost all faith” in trade unions as their fight for contracts that include pension and medical aid benefits nears a decade.

Gauteng is the only province where these employees receive the same protection as other permanently employed government staff, such as nurses. In 2020, CHWs in Gauteng were classified as level-two public servants, so they’re eligible for pension and medical aid benefits and earn between R9,000 and R11,000.

Elsewhere in the country, CHWs have one-year contracts with provincial health departments or work for (and are paid by) non-profits with state deals. As there’s no limit to how many times contracts can be renewed, these workers often stay in their roles for years. But at the age of 60 they have to stop, leaving them with no compensation for their service.

CHWs receive a payout of about R4,000 a month, as part of a 2022 agreement between three unions and the government’s bargaining council for the health and social development sectors. It was set up to help broker deals or resolve disputes between workers (or their unions) and the state. The deal is the third extension of one that was first set out in 2018.

Margaret Gale Mookroof, 41, a CHW with 16 years’ experience, says many of her colleagues have left unions. Though these bodies managed, for example, to change workers’ status from volunteers to formal employees in KwaZulu-Natal in 2014 and helped to cement the 2018 deal, many feel disillusioned by the agreement being extended again to 2025, rather than unions fighting for their services to be insourced by the government. Being recognised as permanent employees, with a pension and medical aid, will help to give them financial stability, they say.

Mookroof says: “They’re failing us, year in and year out.”

Johannes Dyasi*, 57, agrees. In the Northern Cape, where he works, unions only pay attention to CHWs when it suits them, he says, such as when they need to bolster numbers in protests for permanent health staff.

In South Africa, trade unions have historically been a powerful ally for labourers, fighting for more than just workers’ rights. However, despite more than 13-million employees still being registered as union members, researchers have found that many perceive the organisations’ leadership to be corrupt and out of touch with what people want.

Dyasi agrees, saying CHWs in particular get no benefit from membership and there’s been no change to their employment conditions for years.

“We don’t have activists any more, only betrayers taking advantage of vulnerable workers to reach the top.”

Unions’ point of view

However, union bosses don’t agree.

CHWs normally belong to one of four labour organisations (or their affiliates):

• the National Education, Health and Allied Workers Union (Nehawu);
• the Public Servants Association of South Africa (PSA);
• the Health and Other Services Personnel Trade Union of South Africa (Hospersa); or
• the National Union of Public Service and Allied Workers (Nupsaw).  According to Nupsaw general secretary Solly Malema, the union was “instrumental” in the 2014 deal that saw the KwaZulu-Natal health department recognise CHWs as contract employees who are eligible for standard benefits, instead of volunteers.That case, he says, set the groundwork for getting CHWs registered on the government’s salary system instead of them being employed by NGOs. This strengthened their negotiation power to get the 2018 collective agreement signed.Malema says they will continue to fight in the Western Cape, where community workers are still employed by NGOs, because “they’re behaving like a federal state”.

  Asked about Nupsaw’s rejection of a proposed investigation by the labour department into the wages and employment conditions of CHWs, Malema says having a set minimum wage for CHWs will block any chance of them being insourced.

  “CHWs are public servants and they must enjoy the same benefits as public servants [as in Gauteng]. That’s the route we want to go, not this minimum wage process,” he says.

  More work for little pay

  In countries such as South Africa, which has a serious lack of doctors and nurses, CHWs help to carry the load through “task shifting”, which means they take on some of the easier but time-consuming jobs of professional health workers (such as following up on HIV or tuberculosis patients to make sure they take their medication correctly).

  South Africa has just more than 54,000 CHWs and ideally each should be able to reach 150 to 250 households a year, depending on the area they serve.

  Despite an already high workload, their duties have expanded since 2011, when the health department planned for CHWs to look after people’s primary healthcare needs throughout their lives — from antenatal to palliative care and everything in between. This includes preventing lifestyle diseases, for example diabetes, and helping people to recover from strokes or heart attacks. Contributing to community support groups, wellness programmes and activities at early childhood development centres are also part of their job.

  South Africa’s planned National Health Insurance (NHI) scheme will rely heavily on well-trained CHW teams to deliver primary healthcare services.

  Through the NHI, the government will attempt to give all South Africans, documented immigrants and refugees access to the same basic health services free.

  The NHI Bill is being considered by the National Assembly.

  But while CHWs are written into the future of South Africa’s health system, the workers don’t have much to look forward to.

  Mercy Ngwenya*, 55, for example, will have to retire from her job in five years. CHWs can only work for the state until the month of their 60th birthday, says Tebogo Lekgethwane, North West health department spokesperson.

  She’s been a CHW in the Western Cape for more than two decades, yet she’s never held a position with any benefits. Ngwenya worries about what her life will be like then, since her time as a public servant is running out.

  “When I retire, I will have nothing,” she says.

  Dyasi hopes the government’s old-age grant (which pays at most R1,980 a month) will be enough to support him and his family.

  “There’s no dignified tomorrow.”

  A future unsure

  There is no talk of employing CHWs permanently in the Western Cape until the national health department comes up with a plan that outlines CHWs’ responsibilities and pay, says Mark van der Heever, a spokesperson for the province’s health department.

  In October 2022, the national health department received extra funds to spend on personnel after the taxman collected more money than expected.

  However, finance minister Enoch Godongwana warned that much of the state’s extra spending would depend on the outcome of a fight about the public sector wage bill.

  Unions’ demands for a 10% increase were rejected, with the government instead agreeing to a 3% increase and a monthly allowance of between R458 and R1,695, depending on an employee’s salary level. This runs until the end of March.

  In the North West, Joyce Maseko*, 37, doesn’t think anything will change by the time she retires. “They’ll just give [us] forms to claim money from the UIF [Unemployment Insurance Fund].”

  In her province, the health department isn’t planning to insource CHWs either because “provinces have been told not to make any changes to how they’re employing CHWs [until the National Health Council decides on it], according to Lekgethwane.

  For the moment, the national health department is treading water, saying it’s waiting for the outcome of labour colleagues’ proposed look into CHWs’ employment conditions.

  In the meantime, most will just keep doing their jobs — at great personal risk.

  Says Dyasi: “Many of our colleagues died during the Covid pandemic, but to those at the top, it’s just like a fly dropped dead. But we are the foot soldiers. We are the ones sent out to the streets and houses, not knowing what danger lies ahead.”

  • Three of the four CHWs Bhekisisa spoke to for this article requested anonymity out of fear they would lose their jobs. Their identities are known to the centre. 

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