Africa-Press – Eswatini. In an effort to encourage early retirement in the public service, the Enhanced Voluntary Early Retirement Scheme (EVERS) is set to come back.
This transpired during the Mid Term Budget debate that took place on Monday, November 17, 2025 in the House of Assembly. Lobamba Lomdzala Member of Parliament Marwick Khumalo wanted to know what made the Executive not to revive EVERS, especially the Ministry of Public Service.
Khumalo said civil servants who wanted to retire should be allowed to do so because they would be able to participate in growing the country’s economy. He said right now, the civil servants could have benefitted from the salary reviews, but almost half of their salaries would go back to the country’s fiscus. It is better for the workers to be allowed to retire and be given a start-up capital from EVERS.
In response, Minister of Finance Neal Rijkenberg said Government, through the Ministry of Public Service, has identified about 4 000 civil servants that do not need to be there. Rijkenberg said somehow, these people had been able to occupy positions where they worked. This led to a situation where these civil servants were reduced to about 3 200.
He said there was a need for another EVERS and Khumalo made a valid. However, they had a problem previously. The problem was that EVERS was open for every civil servant and that would open an opportunity for people they would not want to retire to apply for EVERS. The people they would want to retire would just not be interested in applying for EVERS.
Minister Rijkenberg suggested that when EVERS re-opened, there would be a need for it to target the civil servants that would be deemed as being a surplus within the public service.
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