THE Guyana Teachers Union (GTU) executive plans to go out to the various regions and meet with teachers to lobby their support for the planned strike action for better salaries.
The industrial action is to begin on August 27. The GTU officially began notifying the teachers of the strike by way of a letter on Monday, appealing to them not to “listen to threats which will come from high offices. You have a right to strike as an employee”.

The letter also called on head teachers to “take school keys to the respective Education Departments from Friday, 21st August 2018”. “Even though the union has called a strike it’s on the individuals to follow through,” explained the GTU president, Mark Lyte. “So we are working to ensure our teachers are convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that this is what we need to do. We intend to visit different (Administrative) regions during this time, to meet our teachers on the ground and further convince those who may be indecisive.”
In an interview with the Guyana Chronicle, Lyte noted that the union will be using every means possible to ensure not only that all teachers are notified of the strike action, but that they are also on board and will support the action.

“The process only started [yesterday] and we will be rigorously pursuing it, using every channel possible to garner support. We’ve prepared official letters that are being sent out, and we have put some notices on social media,” Lyte informed.

“Guyana is a vast array so it’s going to take us a while to reach every corner, but the process has officially commenced and it will continue until every teacher has been made aware of the strike. We can’t reach every teacher by letter so we will use as much as possible social media, television, and whatever other means is available to us.”

Calls in the past for strike action has been met with some amount of non-compliance of some members, however, Lyte said he is confident that this time around this call for a strike will see massive support, simply because the teachers have finally had enough.

“It’s more likely to have more of a support coming from our members this time because the time of waiting has been long, three years, and everyone is so agitated. I did say to the minister that this government created an expectation, every forum you hear: teachers are… teachers are… teachers are… every forum, you hear: something good is going to happen. We waited; we gave them every opportunity and now for this? [The] government cannot be upset when the union takes industrial action. The teachers are very upset,” Lyte noted.

It was last Thursday that a decision was taken by the GTU, on the insistence of its members, to call strike action due to failed talks between the Ministry of Education (MoE) and the GTU.

The teachers asked for the strike to begin from the pre-term activities in the week, prior to school reopening, and a continued absence of teachers in the first week of school. School is expected to resume on September 3. The GTU/MoE meeting marked the last of several that the two bodies have been having over the years as they continue to fail to come to an agreement on a way forward, as it pertains to several issues facing the teachers, most pressing of those being salary negotiations and the teachers’ debauching monies.