Ivorian primary school teachers threaten 3-day strike --[Reported by Umva mag]

Exiled former Ivorian prime minister Guillaume Soro has called on the government to prioritise addressing teachers’ grievances following a threat by the educators to down tools for three days next week.

On 23 September 2024, several trade unions, umbrella organisations and federations of the Ministry of National Education and Literacy, grouped within the MENA Intersyndicale (IS-MENA), gave notice of strike action to the ministry.

This strike notice concerns a 72-hour work stoppage throughout the country from Tuesday 15 October 2024 at 7:30 am (GMT, local time) until Thursday 17 October 2024 at 6:00 pm, in order to demand a satisfactory response to their demands.

The main demands of the trade unions are the granting of an incentive bonus to staff in the education and training sector, and the creation of a school administration sector with the creation of new jobs and a career profile.

In addition, they are demanding the repayment of salaries withheld and suspended from some teachers because of strikes in 2019 and 2020, the upgrading of allowances linked to large-scale examinations and their payment no later than two weeks after the closure of examination secretariats, and the promotion of assistant teachers.

For Guillaume Soro, ‘the legitimacy of the demands made by the MENA inter-union raises the spectre of a turbulent academic year, likely to cause considerable disruption to the school curriculum’.

Through his citizens’ movement, Generations et Peuples Solidaires (GPS), an organisation dissolved by the Ivorian courts, Guillaume Soro is calling on the government to find a solution, as the Ivorian education system, “already in a state of crisis, does not deserve a
blank year”.

“That is why GPS is encouraging the various parties to engage in constructive dialogue for the benefit of teachers, pupils and parents, who have long been suffering under the weight of the high cost of living,” he concludes.

AP/Sf/fss/jn/APA

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