An uphill and losing battle

Feb 14, 2024 Peeping Tom

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Kaieteur News – The teachers are fighting a losing battle. The government will not budge from its position that the teachers’ strike is ‘illegal’ even though the government is yet to provide any evidence of how the strike is illegal.

Government can afford to refuse to come to the negotiating table. The teachers cannot because each day they are on strike, they are losing income, and there will come a time when striking teachers will through exhaustion, frustration and the need for money be forced to trudge back to the classroom.

It is not the lack of militancy that will force the teachers back to work. It is the way of the world. Unions have long lost their bite. Unions are no longer the force they used to be.  Fewer workers are being unionized today than before. Teachers must awaken to this reality.

The Guyana Teachers’ Union is not as formidable as some may believe. Based on the numbers that the government has published, the GTU only represents about one-third of all teachers in Guyana. If the union had represented more than 75% of all teachers, they may have been in a stronger position to resist the pressures that are being applied by the government.

The union’s main weapon is the strike.  But the strike weapon is no longer as potent as before.

The potency of labour strikes has been in decline for the past four decades. Even the once formidable GAWU can hardly call an effective strike in the sugar industry. The increase in automation, contract workers, the fragmentation of the workforce and the changing nature of employment have all contributed to the decline in the potency of industrial action

Unions also have their own problems which have led to alienation of their membership. This includes attempt at hijacking union leadership and the lack of financial accountability. These have eroded confidence by workers in their unions.

Strikers are not paid for the time they are on strike. This is not vindictiveness; this is standard for all strikes except where the terms of resumption provide for payment.  It is for this reason also that strike relief is mobilized to assist strikers for the period for which they are not paid.

You cannot call a strike and then presumptuously expect to be paid. However, the union has promised that teachers will be reimbursed, by ‘corporate sponsors’ for the period they are off the job. This is easier said than done.

The government has now launched a propaganda offensive against the union. It has targeted the union rather than the workers by branding the current teachers’ strike as both illegal and politically motivated. It has cast the union as being manipulative and lacking accountability.

This clear attempt to delegitimize the strike stems from a broader strategy to undermine the grievances of educators and discredit their collective action. By framing the strike as unlawful and politically driven, the government is seeking to sow doubts among the public and erode support for the teachers’ demands.

The labelling of the union as manipulative and unaccountable aims at fostering distrust in its leadership, undermining the solidarity and resolve of its members, thereby obscuring the concerns of the union and the teachers.

Teachers must understand that while they may enjoy sympathy from parents and other workers, this sympathy will wane if the classes are interrupted for an extended period.

Parents will begin to worry about the children writing the CXC examinations. The government is bound to pounce on this and to claim that the teachers are willfully being heartless and disruptive.

While therefore teachers may be determined to hang in for the long haul, history is not on their side. The teachers strike fizzled during the time APNU+AFC and even though there were negotiations with the government, the union was forced to settle for less than they were demanding.

The teachers therefore must revise what their union is asking. Retroactive increases should be taken off the table immediately. The multi-year agreement that they are seeking should be for the period 2024-2026. The teachers should demand realistic wages.

Presently, what the union is demanding cannot be seriously considered much even form the basis for negotiations. Instead of demanding percentages, they should ask themselves what would be considered a decent wage for each category of workers. How much should a trainee teacher earn? How much should a trained teacher earn? How much should a trained graduate teacher earn? How much should a Head of Department earn? How much should a Headmistress earn?

They should do this for each of the categories and then present this to the government as their new demand.

Otherwise, the strike will end in humiliation and bitterness.

(The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of this newspaper.)                       

 

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• APNU+AFC, CXC examinations, financial accountability, Government, GTU only represents, Otherwise

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