Ministry given five working days to respond
Teachers at President’s College have ended their sit-in after meeting with their union, the Guyana Teachers Union (GTU) and deciding to give the Ministry of Education five working days to respond to their concerns.
Minister of Education Shaik Baksh says that the Ministry is in receipt of a letter from the school’s Teachers Association and urged them to return to work while the Ministry engages the GTU. The teachers had said that their grievances include a 5% retroactive payment, the water situation, refurbishing of staff rooms and the complete overhaul of the Home Economics and Science Departments.
Another concern, the appointments of senior teachers, has been resolved.
Vice-President of the Teachers Association, Garvin Blackman told Stabroek News yesterday that teachers had a meeting with officials of the GTU on Wednesday afternoon and they came to a decision that they would administer the students’ exams, which began yesterday, while giving the Education Ministry five working days to respond to the issues raised. Should no response be received, they would resume their sit-in, he warned.
The Ministry is engaging the GTU, Baksh says. In an interview with the Government Information Agency (GINA), he disputed that the teachers did not receive the additional five percent for 2008, explaining that it was catered for under the Ministry’s agreement with the GTU as the recognised union. However, in December an additional five percent was agreed on and it is this amount that they haven’t received since it is under active consideration by the Ministries of Education and Finance, GINA reported.
The education minister explained that there has been some delay in finalizing a decision because of the various benefits received by PC teachers. “All teachers are receiving what is known as the duty allowances of $5000 to $6000 per month and a housing allowance of $2000 per month, also some of the senior staff receive 25% allowances on their salary…so we wanted to look very closely at what is taking place and who should benefit from the 5% in the light of these various allowances,” he was quoted as saying. He added that the Teachers Association was informed of this by the Chairman of the school’s board.
Meantime, the minister acknowledged that water supply has always been a problem at the school and said that provisions have been made in the 2009 budget for more water tanks which are expected to be available in time for the next school year. “The long term objective to solve this problem would be to drill a new well but this would be too costly.
To drill a new well would cost about $80M to $90M and we don’t have that kind of money so we have to work with Guyana Water Incorporated to solve this problem,” he told GINA.
The Minister said that he was particularly bothered by the teachers’ final ground for taking the industrial action which is the refurbishing of the science and home economics departments, staff and class rooms.
He said this came as a surprise because this was never raised as an issue. “I have spoken to the Chairman of the Board and the Principal and nothing in the minutes reflect that this matter was raised at the board level,” he said, adding that he personally checked the minutes of the Board’s meeting and this issue was never raised. “There is a representative of the teachers on the board and also a representative of GTU in the person of the President and it never came to a high level to the Permanent Secretary of Education, nor the Chief or Regional Educational officers to draw our attention that these things need attention,” he said.
On the issue of delayed senior appointments, the Education Minister said the posts have already been filled, explaining that they were only advertised this year and recommendations were made in April.
Minister Baksh said he considers the action by some of the teachers as “precipitous” noting that GTU last week raised the five percent increase with him and he has been working since then to resolve this matter.
According to GINA, the Ministry plans to replace the roof of the College’s science laboratory in August. Government has expended significant sums of money on the institution over the years, GINA said stating that the expenditure on the school was $163M in 2007, $168M in 2008 and in 2009, $186M. In addition, a dormitory was completed in 2008 at a cost of $84M, it said. The male dormitory had been destroyed by fire in 2004.