Teachers' deliver petition on rescue package to Parliament

Neglected and long-suffering teachers of Zimbabwe, (today) the 6th of June 2019 presented a Petition to Parliament in Harare, demanding that government which is the main employer of Teachers in Government schools must immediately deliver an economic rescue package to cushion the hard-pressed Teachers, some of whom can no longer make it to work stations due to spiralling costs of transport and the rising cost of living in general.

Presenting their Petition in Harare to Parliament were the most representative bodies of teacher trade unions comprising of the Zimbabwe Teachers Association, (ZIMTA) and the Progressive Teachers Union, (PTUZ), who petitioned Parliament to cause Government to pay a cushioning allowance in United States dollars to every teacher over and above their soon to be reviewed RTGs Salaries.

The Petition presented by the Teacher Unions, is seeking for the intervention of legislators in facilitating that Teachers' low salaries and allowances that are paid by government in RTGs Dollars should also be reviewed and paid in full consideration of the inter-bank rate because the same salaries were computed on contracts which were consummated before the announcement of the Reserve Bank Monetary Policy which sought to review, the exchange rate.

Outlined in the Petition was also the fact that the Teachers want Parliament in light of its oversight and legislative role of protecting the provisions of the Constitution and national interests, to undertake, insist and ensure that the State promptly reviews, calculates and pay teachers ‘salaries in line with the current rate of inflation.

Teachers in Zimbabwe make the largest percentage of the restive civil servants, whose wages and salaries have been thoroughly wiped by the ever-rising inflation that has hit Zimbabwe for the past several months.

Ongoing talks between civil servants who are represented at APEX Council level and the Government have been consistently failing to yield results for a period spanning over seven years, a situation which analysts have blamed on the obsolete subsidiary law providing social dialogue in the civil service. The present scenario in salary negotiations does not provide for sectoral labour bargaining processes, hence as a result, civil servants negotiate for salary reviews as a collective, and in the process, the unique needs of specialized fields such as teaching are not given prominence at the National Joint Negotiating Forum(NJNC).

Teachers through their trade unions are calling for the establishment of legislation that should see the facilitation of Sectoral Collective Bargaining systems, a process that they anticipate to bring relief to ineffective labour bargaining processes.

The submission of a Petition to The Parliament by Teachers comes against a backdrop of massive calls for tools downing, re- introductions of sit-ins and all forms of incapacitation declarations from Teachers, who are also members of the trade unions.

The majority of the Teachers in government and public schools across Zimbabwe, are employed by Government, and recent surveys carried under ZIMTA have shown that the majority of them are loyal and dedicated employees who work for more than 8 hours a day in schools , and yet relying on one source of income , which is a salary from Government.
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