Direct Request (CEACR) - adopted 2024, published 113rd ILC session (2025)

Equal Remuneration Convention, 1951 (No. 100) - Uganda (Ratification: 2005)

Articles 2 and 3. Application of the principle of equal remuneration for work of equal value in the wage determination machinery in the public sector. Objective job evaluation. In its report, the Government clarifies that the Public Finance and Management Act 2015 mandates the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development (MoFPED) and the Equal Opportunities Commission (EOC) to issue a certificate that attests to the gender-responsiveness and equity of the national annual budget. According to the Government, this ensures the absence of gender bias in job evaluation. The Government also indicates that job analysis undertaken for the entire public service was conducted based on job classification, irrespective of gender, but does not provide information on how concretely it was ensured that the criteria used were free of gender bias so that the evaluation factors, such as qualifications, efforts, responsibility and working conditions, in jobs predominantly occupied by women were not undervalued in comparison to those in jobs predominantly occupied by men. It also notes the Government statement that it is reviewing the civil service pay structure and undertook comprehensive performance management that included placing senior managers on performance contracts. While noting that the result of this exercise was not disaggregated by gender, the Committee recalls that there is sometimes confusion between “performance appraisal”, which aims at evaluating the performance of an individual worker in carrying out his or her job, and “objective job evaluation”, which is to measure the relative worth of jobs with varying content on the basis of the work to be performed. The principle of the Convention is concerned with objective job evaluation, i.e. evaluating the value of a job and not the performance of an individual worker. The Committee therefore requests the Government to provide information on the measures taken to ensure that objective job evaluation methods used are free from gender bias, for example how it ensured that the selection of factors for comparison (qualifications, efforts, responsibility and working conditions, etc.), the weighting of such factors and the actual comparison carried out are not discriminatory, either directly or indirectly.

Minimum wages. The Committee notes the response of the Government that the Employment Act provides for the principle of equal pay for men and women for work of equal value. The Government also indicates that the Minimum Wages Advisory and Wages Council Act (1957), which regulates the renumeration and conditions of employment of employees, remains in force. However, the Committee notes that the Government has not provided the requested information on the adoption of a minimum-wage scheme, particularly in female dominated sectors. The Committee recalls that, in August 2019, following the decision of the President to refuse to assent to the Minimum Wage Bill, the Minimum Wages Advisory Board was requested to undertake a comprehensive study of the economy and make recommendations to the Government on the feasibility of fixing a minimum wage in the country which have been submitted to Cabinet for discussion and approval by the end of November 2019. The Committee notes with regret that the Government did not provide any information on the final decision regarding the adoption of a minimum-wage mechanism. The Committee wishes to recall that setting of minimum wages is an important means by which the Convention is applied, and that a uniform national minimum-wage system helps to raise the earnings of the lowest paid (in particular women), and thus reduces gender pay gap. The Committee therefore reiterates its request to the Government to provide information on: (i) the measures taken to ensure that the principle of equal remuneration for men and women for work of equal value is taken into consideration throughout the development of minimum wages setting machinery, in particular in sectors with a high proportion of women; and (ii) any progress made towards the adoption of minimum-wage schemes.

Article 4. Cooperation with employers’ and workers’ organizations. The Committee welcomes the Government’s indication that a tripartite Labour Advisory Board was reconstituted on 2 February 2024 to advise the Minister on matters that are affecting employment and industrial relations. The Committee requests the Government to continue to provide information on the functioning of the new Labour Advisory Board and the results achieved, as well as any other initiatives undertaken by workers’ and employers’ organizations with a view to promoting the principle of the Convention.

Statistics. The Committee notes, from the main report of the Uganda Bureau of Statistics on the national labour force survey 2021, that the median monthly cash earnings for persons whose main job is in paid employment was 568,000 and 542,000 Ugandan shillings respectively for men and women workers in the public sector, whereas it was 240,000 shillings and 150,000 shillings respectively in the private sector, that is, namely 1.6 times more for men than for women. The Committee further notes that median monthly earnings for women with disability in paid employment are 2.4 times less than that of men with disability. Furthermore, the Government has not provided information on the planned conduct of a specific gender pay survey, or existing data on gender pay gap. The Committee requests the Government, once again, toindicate if any specific gender pay gap survey has been conducted and to provide any updated statistical data available on the distribution of men and women in the public and private sectors and their corresponding earnings and any statistical information available relating specifically to the gender pay gap.