Swaziland cabinet ministers accepts 10% pay cut

Swaziland's cabinet ministers have accepted a 10 percent salary cut as the country tries to claw its way out of a budget crisis, Prime Minister Barnabas Sibusiso Dlamini said Friday.
Civil servants last week protested against government moves to slash its wage bill, required by the International Monetary Fund for the tiny kingdom to access much-needed loans.
"There clearly needs to be an appropriate level of sacrifice within the civil service and parliament to reduce the payroll cost to a manageable level," Dlamini told Swaziland's Times newspaper.
The IMF said Swaziland needed to slash its wage bill by five percent, but also recommended leaving untouched the salaries of workers earning less than 10,000 euros ($14,000) a year.
Muzi Mhlanga, secretary general of the Swaziland National Alliance of Teachers, said he could not see his members agreeing to the cuts.
"The average teacher's salary is 7,000 emalangeni ($1,000, 700 euros) a month, while politicians are earning 50,000. They won't feel the pinch like us," he told AFP.
Thousands of public workers took to the streets on March 18 to protest the salary cuts and to demand Dlamini's resignation earlier.
Half of all state spending goes into paying salaries for 35,000 civil servants.
Earnings from a regional customs union -- Swaziland's main source of income -- plummeted last year, leaving the economy in crisis.
As the government struggles to make ends meet, retirees last month discovered their pensions had been used to pay grants for AIDS orphans.
This week government announced lavish celebrations of King Mswati III's 25-year reign would be held in April -- despite widespread calls to cancel the party.