6b. Working and living conditions for workers During 2013, thousands of Zimbabwean workers continued to grapple with grinding poverty, slave wages in much of the public and private sector, and continued to suffer from assaults on their fundamental rights and freedoms. This is despite the right to work having been enshrined in Article 23.1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and being recognised in the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and in the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights39. Both private and public sector workers continued to receive slave wages five years after the formation of the inclusive government and despite endless promises by politicians to review and improve their torrid working conditions. While there were workers struggling to survive on wages ranging between $150 and $300 per month members of the government, were enjoying expensive lifestyles. They elected to be blind to the workers’ plight because they are covered by the unfair salary structures and the allowances they amass from sometimes superfluous foreign excursions and other questionable activities including the opaque accounting for the country’s mineral wealth. There were reports that the suspended ZBC chief executive Happison Muchechetere was earning $27,000 per month along with a monthly allowance of $3,000 and another $2,500 for his domestic staff. Added to the hefty pay packet, the CEO was also entitled to 5 business class air tickets with his family, three air tickets within the region and unlimited air travelling in Zimbabwe, yet ZBC had failed to pay its workers for six months as it teeters on the brink of collapse40. This followed the revelation that the current economic policies are benefiting a few individuals as revealed by ZANU PF Phillip Chiyangwa unexplained wealth which include over 100 properties and farms countrywide, 40 businesses41. Rights groups called upon all employers and the government to respond to the workers’ plight by paying all workers a minimum wage above the PDL, and improving their working conditions including access to life-prolonging anti-retroviral drugs and functional health facilities. Responsibility for the failure to remunerate workers with Poverty Datum Line (PDL) linked salaries and improve their working conditions lies squarely and fully on the shoulders of the inclusive government. They have proven that almost five years after presiding over the state of the country’s affairs they are simply unconcerned with the challenges faced by workers and those outside their ivory towers. 6.c General economic and social rights Although for historical reasons there are two distinct covenants, on civil and political rights (ICCPR) and economic, social and cultural rights (ICESCR), there is only one set of human rights, as originally outlined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. UN Member States, including Zimbabwe, agreed at the World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna in 1993 that “all human rights are universal, indivisible and interdependent and interrelated,” and that “the international community must treat human rights globally in a fair and equal manner, on the same footing, and with the same emphasis.” This implied recognition that no human right can be achieved fully without the enjoyment of other rights42. The government of Zimbabwe acceded to the International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) in August 1991. However the old constitution did not include economic, social and cultural rights as part of the bill of rights. The new constitution includes economic, social and cultural rights, such as language and cultural rights, freedom of profession, trade or occupation, labour rights; property rights; rights to agricultural land; environmental rights right to education, health care; and right to food and water. The bill of rights also includes a clause which states that the bill of rights is not a closed list and allows for the 39 ZLHR, May Day Statement 40 http://allafrica.com/stories/201312100464.html 41 http://www.swradioafrica.com/2013/11/29/chiyangwas-divorce-reveals-his-wealth/ 42 Navi Pillay, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights at the University of Zimbabwe, May 24, 2012, http://www.newzimbabwe.com/opinion-8073-Full%20text%20UN%20rights%20chiefs%20lecture%20at%20UZ/opinion.asp 65