Collective Bargaining Agreement Harare Municipal Undertaking General Conditions of Service
Harare City Council's lowest-paid workers move from ZWL$49 152,19 to ZWL$74 760,09 basic, with an extra US$50 cushioning allowance across the board — backdated to 1 October 2022.
This registered collective bargaining agreement covers salaries and cushioning allowances for the Harare Municipal Undertaking. It is between Harare Municipality and four unions — MWUZ, ZUCWU (Harare Branch), WAWUZ and ZAMWU.
The basic salary for the lowest paid grade rises from ZWL$49 152,19 to ZWL$74 760,09, an increase of about 52%. Part of that comes from restructuring rather than new money: half the existing cushioning allowance is folded into the basic salary, leaving the other half as an RTGS cushioning allowance.
On top of that, an additional cushioning allowance of US$50 is awarded across the board — a flat amount for every employee, not a percentage. The employer is to put in place the logistics of paying it. All other hygienic allowances stay as they are.
The agreement states its own effective date as 1 October 2022. It was signed at Harare on 9 October 2022 but only gazetted on 23 February 2024, roughly sixteen months later, so it is a retrospective record of a settled position. It also flags unfinished business: an exercise to correct grade differentials and the salary scale, to be signed as an addendum, and a periodic review that was to start in the first week of November 2022.
Because only the lowest grade is quantified, the agreement does not show what the other grades are paid — that depends on the grade differential exercise the parties left to an addendum that is not part of this instrument.
What changed
- Lowest paid grade basic salary raised from ZWL$49 152,19 to ZWL$74 760,09
- Half of the existing cushioning allowance is absorbed into basic salary, half retained in RTGS
- An additional US$50 cushioning allowance is awarded across the board
- Other hygienic allowances remain unchanged
- Effective date of the increase is 1 October 2022
- Grade differentials and the salary scale are to be corrected by a separate addendum
Who this affects
- Harare City Council employees
- members of MWUZ, ZUCWU, WAWUZ and ZAMWU in Harare
- Harare Municipality payroll and human capital staff
- Harare ratepayers funding the wage bill
Plain-language summary — not legal advice. Always read the full instrument.