About 450 temporary workers engaged to conduct the 2026 Lesotho Housing and Population Census are demanding payment of outstanding wages and allowances nearly five months after completing their assignments.
The workers, comprising enumerators and assistant supervisors, accuse the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning, through the Bureau of Statistics, of failing to honour its payment commitments, with some also disputing discrepancies in the amounts received.
Speaking on behalf of the affected workers who worked as an assistant supervisor, Lepota Mafeka, said outstanding claims include April allowances of M10,850 per worker, May allowances of M6,650, additional payments for a five-day extension granted to some staff and M350 allegedly omitted from May allowances.
If all 451 workers were owed the full April allowance, the outstanding amount for that month alone would be approximately M4.89 million. However, the figure is an estimate based on that allowance rate and does not represent a verified total of all outstanding payments.
“Our concern is that it has been almost five months since we completed the work, but we have still not received our allowances and wages. There is also the M350 omission from the May allowance, and we do not know why,” Mafeka told theReporter this week.
The workers lodged a complaint with the Senate Petition Committee on Tuesday, seeking Parliament’s intervention to secure payment. They warned that they could take legal action if their grievances remain unresolved.
In their petition, they said 451 temporary employees had been left waiting for compensation, with some receiving incomplete payments for April and May.
The workers urged Parliament to ensure that outstanding payments are settled and discrepancies investigated.
Mafeka said workers incurred transport and mobile data expenses during the exercise, while some promised equipment, including tablets, reflective vests, power banks, backpacks and identification stickers, was either unavailable or delivered late.
In some areas, he noted, stickers arrived after households had already been counted, making it difficult for enumerators to return and affix them.
“Our contracts stated that allowances would be paid before the work began and wages at the end of the assignment. However, some of us did not receive either the allowances or the wages,” he claimed.
The workers also alleged that documents, including bank confirmation letters, had been misplaced, while explanations for the delays included incomplete paperwork and problems with the system used to process payments.
Mafeka further alleged that poor record-keeping and weak coordination between the Bureau’s headquarters and district offices had contributed to the problem.
The workers also questioned differences in payments to people performing similar duties, saying some enumerators received about M10,000 while others received about M12,000. They want the authorities to explain how the amounts were calculated.
Responding to the concerns, Acting Deputy Principal Secretary in the Ministry of Finance and Development Planning, Mahlape Ramoseme, said 6,346 of the 6,797 workers engaged for the census had been paid, leaving 451 cases outstanding.
Of these, she said, 369 payments were being processed, with payment expected by next Friday (today), while 82 workers could not be traced. She appealed to those still awaiting payment to come forward for verification.
Ramoseme attributed the delays to several challenges, including newly appointed accounts and human resources staff who lacked experience from previous census exercises, as well as a new payment system that required multiple copies of workers’ documents to be submitted for processing.
She stated that some identification documents and bank confirmation letters had gone missing, complicating payment processing.
The ministry also enlisted accountants from other ministries to help clear the backlog, but the involvement of multiple payment points raised concerns about possible duplicate payments.
“As a result, we stopped the payments in August and asked those who had not been paid to come forward,” she indicated.
Ramoseme added that inconsistencies in personal information, particularly among married workers, had further delayed verification. Some had failed to provide proof of marriage required to confirm their details.
