Africa-Press – Cape verde. The African Independence Party of Cape Verde (PAICV-opposition) accused the Government this Tuesday of trying to deceive Cape Verdean teachers, indicating that just over 2,300 teachers saw their situation resolved, but the party in power refutes the accusations.
The accusation was made by deputy Julião Varela, after being questioned by journalists about the teachers’ strike, scheduled for this Wednesday and Thursday, aiming to paralyze teaching if the Government does not specifically resolve the issue of salary adjustments.
However, he recalled that in 2015, the Government led by PAICV prepared and implemented the career statute for teaching staff, granted a 3% salary increase and also managed to regularize all teachers’ outstanding issues.
“ This Government froze everything and put the statute in a drawer so as not to recognize any right to promotion and progression and it itself has just confessed, through a published document, that only 2,341 teachers out of approximately eight thousand will have benefited in these eight years”, he said .
According to Julião Varela, the problem is that just over 2,300 benefited from either reclassification or the granting of a subsidy for not reducing their working hours and nothing else.
“ I saw an exercise carried out in which the prime minister’s salary in one month corresponds to the salary of a teacher in one year, at a certain level”, pointed out the deputy, who argued that it is necessary to implement a new salary grid to correct the discrepancy existing.
For her part, deputy Elisabete Évora, from the Movement for Democracy (MpD), the party that supports the Government, considered that Cape Verde is a democratic country and that everyone has the right to demonstrate and go on strike.
“ For our group, it is nothing strange, on the contrary, we urge teachers to sit at the table with the Government and labor entities to resolve the issues, but it is something natural that must be faced in the best way possible and seek to resolve the problems” , he stressed.
Asked about the unions’ proposal asking for a 36% increase, the deputy considers that this increase “ is impossible” and that at the moment the Government does not have the conditions to allow it to respond to this proposal.
In the same vein, he said that Ulisses Correia e Silva’s executive is open to negotiation, and recalled that since 2016, when he took over the Government, he has been working to resolve teachers’ issues.
During a press conference held this morning, the National Union of Teachers (Sindep) announced that the strike is inevitable, as the Government is “deceiving and deceiving the teaching class ” with promises and maneuvers.
He appealed to all teachers from Santo Antão to Brava to remain united, strong and cohesive to win this fight, ensuring that Sindep, as a trade union organization representing the class, is willing to go to the extreme, warning the Government that it is now the time to act and comply.
“Just yesterday I was with the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance, we don’t want blackmail, promises, now is the time to do and not what we are going to do, and the teaching class has suffered more than anyone else, since 2016 to this point. the teaching class did not see even a penny in their salary and it is not acceptable that the Government has the courage to tell teachers that they do not deserve a special status” , highlighted Jorge Cardoso.
Regarding the list of requalifications for the number of teachers released by the Government this Monday, the union leader said that this is a matter of maneuvers, as the requalification for the years 2020, 2021 and 2022 needs to be done all at once.
Counting on more than 80% of teachers joining the strike, the president of Sindep also announced an upcoming strike for December, threatening the total interruption of education in the country.
“Because if the Government does not back down and respect the teachers we will in fact come to a standstill, we are determined to do so, we are fed up with talk, the teachers want their problems resolved, especially salary adjustments for now”, assured Jorge Cardoso .
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