Deadly result of whistleblowing

Workers' union says municipal staff need protection

- THAMI MAGUBANE

POOR service delivery, politics, and whistleblowing have turned the local government sphere into a “war zone,’ resulting in the deaths of close to 150 municipal workers in the past six years.

The South African Municipal Workers Union (Samwu) revealed that since 2018, about 148 municipal workers have been assassinated. It stated that whistleblowing is now the leading cause of these killings and called for municipal workers, especially those who work in procurement, to be provided with protection even beyond their workplace.

The union indicated that the statistics were gleaned from several reports compiled by a nongovernmental organisation.

Samwu general secretary Dumisani Magagula detailed the extent of the problem and the threat faced by municipal workers during an interview with a television news channel.

He stated that the data was compiled by the Crisis Mapping Association and Corruption Watch, which has also gathered data with the union and Stats SA on killings in local government.

“It was revealed that since 2018, 148 officials have been killed. It's a very bad picture, and it shows that we are in a war zone in local government.