The Rwanda Workers’ Trade Union Confederation has requested the government to increase the salaries of nurses and reduce their working hours so as to be productive.

The call was made on international labour day held on Monday, May 1, 2023.

"In our assessment, we realized that the nurses get a salary equivalent to between Rwf120,000 and Rwf200,000. In addition to the low salary they get, more than 70 per cent of them work more than 60 hours per week,” said Africain Biraboneye, the General-Secretary of Rwanda Workers’ Trade Union Confederation.

Rwanda revised the law related to working hours per week from 45 to 40 in order to enable employees to fulfil other obligations.

ALSO READ: Health personnel want to benefit from changes to working hours.

Official working hours are currently eight, starting from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm, excluding a one-hour lunch break.

However, the government stated that essential services to the public will remain available throughout the day.

The announcement of new working hours was to take effect from January 1, 2023.

The Ministry of Health informed personnel working in all health facilities and the general public that working hours in health facilities would remain the same as was the case in 2022.

Biraboneye recommended a shift work in sectors such as health, hotels, and private companies, among others.

According to Rwanda Nurses and Midwives Union (RNMU), nurses and midwives account for 62 per cent of workers who provide medical care yet they get a meagre salary.

ALSO READ: Nurses, midwives demand salary raise.

"Nurses, during Covid-19, didn’t even get horizontal promotion yet they played a big role in fighting the pandemic,” he said.

Faustin Mwambari, the Head of the Employment Ecosystem Policy and Strategy Department in the Ministry of Public Service and Labour, said that although nurses get low salaries, there are different initiatives being implemented to incentivize employees in the health sector.

Rwanda Workers’ Trade Union Confederation has also called for increasing salaries for executive secretaries of cells across the country adding that the current salaries in general are not helping to cope with prices on the market.

"We request all employers to increase workers’ salaries,” said Biraboneye, calling for minimum wage and addressing the rise of the cost of living.