Rejecting Austerity, Defending Public Services
Nov 14, 2025
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- #No to Austerity!
- #End IMF Austerity: Stop Public Employment Cuts
At the 14th African and Arab Countries Regional Conference, PSI affiliates adopted a resolution rejecting IMF-driven austerity measures for deepening poverty, weakening public services, and eroding workers’ rights and social protections across the region. Affiliates called for an end to austerity, increased public investment, expansionary economic policies, progressive taxation, and stronger engagement with international financial institutions to protect decent work and quality public services.
RESOLUTION #2: AUSTERITY MEASURES ARE DETRIMENTAL TO QUALITY PUBLIC SERVICES AND AN AFFRONT TO THE DIGNITY OF WORKERS AND SOCIETY
The 14th Africa and the Arab Countries Region Conference (AFRECON) Meeting in Accra, Ghana, 11-14 November 2025
NOTING that austerity measures driven by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) stifle investment in public services, undermine the right to basic services such as healthcare, suppress economic growth, and entrench poverty and inequality;
AWARE that austerity measures often cause a retrogression in the enjoyment of economic, social and cultural rights. Cuts to investment and public spending inevitably affect the delivery of public services and programmes that benefit the poor, such as the right to work, education, health and access to clean water;
CONCERNED that several countries in the region have implemented austerity measures that have led to increased unemployment and poverty levels, difficult collective bargaining processes, and deteriorating public services.
RESOLVES to:
Demand an immediate cessation of the implementation of austerity measures where they are in place, and increase public investment in public services, including state-sponsored infrastructure projects, to create employment.
Encourage states to adopt expansionary fiscal and macroeconomic policies that create decent jobs, fulfilling the right to work and enabling people to live with dignity.
The PSI uses its consultative status in ECOSOC to influence the IMF and World Bank's decision to prescribe austerity measures as conditions for loans.
States should implement progressive tax reforms, such as higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations, to raise adequate revenue.
Submitted by: National Union of Public Service & Allied Workers (NUPSAW), South Africa