Zimbabwe teachers said yesterday they would not be
returning to their work stations next Tuesday when the schools open for the second
term, unless the government reviewed their salaries.
Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ)
secretary-general, Raymond Majongwe, also accused the government of spurning
their calls for dialogue.
"We have communicated to government that things are
bad. We asked them to organise a meeting, but they are not responding. Judging
from what is on the ground, teachers are not going to teach.
"We tried our best to engage the government, and so
they must not blame us if our members fail to come to work. We gave them enough
time but they did nothing," Majongwe told the Daily News.
Amalgamated Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (Artuz)
secretary-general, Robson Chere, also said their members would be embarking on
a go-slow. "We have resolved to embark on a series of protests, to demand
a living wage. We have since written to the
ministry of Labour and Social Welfare and also ministry of Finance about
our eroded wages.
"However, they seem reluctant to act and we are fully
aware that the language they understand most is through action, and our members
are ready for that.
"Our members are just going to check in on Tuesday,
but they are not going to undertake any duties. We are having a sit-in whilst
we prepare to escalate the protest to a higher level." Chere said.
Early this month, the government announced salary
increments ranging from 13 percent to 29 percent depending on grades, leaving
the lowest paid State worker getting RTGS $600.
Zimbabwe is experiencing its worst economic crisis in a
decade — amid growing fears that the country's economy could be slipping back
to the horror 2008 hyper-inflationary era. As a measure of the scale of the
crisis facing the country, which has heightened calls for political dialogue
between Mnangagwa and Chamisa, official inflation has now hit 66,8 percent —
the highest recorded in the southern African nation since it abandoned the
worthless Zimbabwe dollar in 2009.
So dire is the economic crisis that Mnangagwa used his
Independence Day celebrations address last month to warn companies against
hiking the prices of basic consumer goods, which he said was unjustified.
On Wednesday, the government also appealed to companies to
slash the prices of basic consumer goods as labour unions and the opposition
warned of massive protests against the high cost of living in the country.
Daily News
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