Pretoria - Government's veiled threat of reverting back to its original salary offer is tantamount to throwing a petrol bomb into a fire, the Independent Labour Caucus (ILC) said on Wednesday.
"There's a threat that if less than 5% of unions sign government's final offer the employer will revert back to the 5.2% salary increase and a R620 per month housing allowance," ILC chairperson Chris Klopper told a media briefing in Pretoria.
"If that is true, there will be total anarchy in this country," he said.
Unions would also proceed with further industrial action if government unilaterally implemented its final offer of 7%.
Klopper said there was no truth in the statement that government had increased the salary offer to 8.5%.
Government had attempted to "pass off" an annual salary progression of 1.5% as part of the final salary increase offer, he said.
Health and Other Service Personnel Trade Union of SA (Hospersa) spokesperson Rifos Mahlake said: "The system of salary progression is an integral right of employees' employment contracts that does not form part of negotiations with the government."
The salary progression for nurses was three percent every two years, one and a half percent for the medical sector every year, and one percent for the education sector every year, he said.
"We have heard this apparent offer through the media, but there is nothing on the table," Public Servants' Association (PSA) spokesperson Manie de Clercq said.
Klopper said it seemed as if government wanted to negotiate through the media using the "ostrich politics" approach, rather than return to the bargaining table.
Long-term benefits"The ILC is extremely disappointed with the lack of leadership and statesmanship exhibited by the employer regarding their reluctance to implement any possible measures to resolve the present impasse," he said.
"Something needs to be done and the problem needs to be addressed... the ILC has repeatedly stated that we are available on a 24/7 basis to return to the bargaining table."
According to Mahlake, the strike could expand to other sectors if the public servants' problems were not addressed.
National Union of Public Service and Allied Workers (Nupsaw) spokesperson Success Mataitsane said the strikes were not only about monetary gain.
"This is also about the long-term benefits... the housing allowance... the fact that if two public servants are married, only one will get the allowance," he said.
"It is about synchronising the bargaining process with the budget process that happens every year. The budget every year for salary increases is always set... why shouldn't it be open to negotiation?" he asked.
The ILC condemned the violence and intimidation by strikers, as well as the disregard of a court interdict that had ordered essential services to return to work, saying they had communicated it was unacceptable.
However, strikers' actions were largely a symptom of no conclusion to a minimum service level agreement for essential services the ILC had been demanding for more than a decade.
Klopper said the duration of the strike would be determined by their members.
The ILC planned to participate in protest marches around the country on Thursday as a symbol of its frustration towards the collective bargaining process and government's offer of 7% and a R700 a month housing allowance.
Marches would start at 9am and end at provincial legislature buildings in, among others, Johannesburg, Cape Town, Durban, Polokwane, Mafikeng and Umtata.