-PM assures of gov’t support

THE Guyana Teachers Union (GTU) was able to garner the attention of Prime Minister Moses Nagamootoo, after they held a torchlight vigil last evening along Main Street, which included a stop at State House and ended in front of the Prime Minister’s official residence.
Some 100 teachers and GTU representatives were part of the two-hour-long activity, which began outside the Bank of Guyana, and was organised to bring attention to several longstanding, as well as recent issues that have been plaguing teachers.

After speaking with the gathering, Nagamootoo promised that he would do whatever he could to look into the complaints and asked that the GTU submit the necessary documents to his office. In addition, the Prime Minister joined the picketers in singing hymns and said that government was facing severe financial challenges, but will keep faith with the working class. “Even if we cannot meet your needs, your demands, we are going to listen to you and keep the door open for dialogue,” Prime Minister Nagamootoo, who is also performing duties of president, said.

The vigil took place after meetings with Parking Meter Company, Smart City Solutions, (SCS) fell through. According to GTU president, Mark Lyte, SCS is offering a 35% discount to teachers who have parking meters erected outside of their places of employment. However, Lyte flatly proclaimed, that is not enough. “Our teachers are not paying anything!” Lyte firmly said, as he spoke just across the street from State House. He continued, that it is “an insult for our teachers to have to pay out of their already small salaries.”

Lyte did, however, offer the GTU’s proposed solution if no consensus could be reached on the parking meter fiasco. “If [SCS] insists that [teachers] must pay, then the Ministry of Education will have to find the money for those parking,” Lyte advocated.
But the parking meter was just the tip of the iceberg of issues that the GTU says it needs to see addressed. The list of issues also includes their demands for increases in teachers’ salaries, unpaid debunching monies, duty-free concessions for eligible teachers, as well as clothing, hardline and station allowances, Whitley Council leave, and money thereof.

“Teachers are the pillars on which a nation stands and if the pillars fall down, the whole nation will fall and somebody is not getting this message very clearly. It seems as if nobody seems to be concerned, other than verbally saying teachers are important. So our teachers are out here and we are saying we want some very clear actions,” Lyte said.
Lyte stated that teachers from as far back as 2008–2011, who were then entitled to duty-free concessions, never received their due, some retiring without even seeing it come to realisation. He says these teachers still deserve their concessions.

The union also wants to see the Whitley Council leave moved from being given every four years, to being given every three years, and for leave-related emoluments to be available prior to the teachers going on leave. But it was in 2008 that then GTU President Colwyn King set the limitations of the Whitley Council leave emoluments after “problems of accountability had arisen.”

Lyte also highlighted that there currently exists no agreement between the GTU and the MoE, as none has been established since the last agreement expired in December 2015. The GTU had since submitted an agreement, but according to Lyte, after “about 20 or so discussions” with the MoE, there has still been no “forward movement.”

However, in early 2016, there were some who believed that the proposal put forth by the GTU was somewhat too far-reaching. According to reports, the initial plan included “an across-the-board increase in salary of 40% for 2016; 45% increase in 2017; 50% in 2018; 50% in 2019; and 50% in 2020” and “one motor vehicle to be given to GTU biennially.”
Lyte related that the vigils are expected to continue tonight and tomorrow night, with GTU hoping to also target the residences of the Ministers of Finance, State and Education. Lyte hinted that if their peaceful protests do not bear fruit, strike action may very well follow.