Sunday, May 21, 2006

Union warns striking CB teachers

By EMELDA MWITWA

SECONDARY School Teachers Union of Zambia (SESTUZ) national president, Lyson Mando, has warned striking teachers on the Copperbelt of serious consequences of illegal industrial action.

And SESTUZ Copperbelt provincial secretary, Dexter Kabwidi, has said that the strike was spreading, with five provinces being affected.

In an interview, Mr Mando warned the teachers that striking without following the legal procedure had its own dire consequences.

In an interview, Mr Mando said as a national leadership, SESTUZ was appealing to the striking teachers to resume work immediately because they did not want them to lose their jobs.

Although it was the obligation of the union to protect their members, they did not want teachers to make themselves vulnerable to reproach by the employer.

Mr Mando cited the case of 69 teachers in Mufulira who were suspended after they went on strike last year. He said the union was still struggling to have the suspensions lifted.

Mr Mando was commenting on the strike by teachers on the Copperbelt who are demanding arrears arising from disparities in their salary scales.

He said it was risky for a few teachers to go on strike.

The teachers, who have been relegated to the ESS 10 scale, are protesting under-payment, while their counterparts in Luapula, Eastern, Northern, North-Western, Southern and Western provinces were enjoying better pay under the ESS 9 salary scale.

Since 2003, secondary school teachers in Lusaka, Central and Copperbelt provinces have remained in ESS 10, while their colleagues of equal qualifications were getting more money.

Mr Mando said the national executive committee appreciated the teachers' grievances but wanted them to resume work because procedure was not followed before they withdrew their labour.

He said NEC had, however, declared a dispute over the teachers' grievances and a conciliatory process was still going on.

"We are appealing to our members to be patient until this legal process is completed. Their grievances are genuine, but the industrial action is irregular," Mr Mando said.

The SESTUZ which declared a dispute with the employer last year, feared that the strike by the members on the Copperbelt might jeorpadise the conciliatory process.

He said the conciliatory process was almost coming to an end, and if the teachers will not be satisfied with the process, they will carry out the ballot to either go on strike, or take the matter to court.

Mr Mando disclosed that their meeting with the Secretary to the Cabinet, Joshua Kanganja, which was scheduled to take place in Lusaka last week, will have to be rescheduled as Dr Kanganja had an urgent matter to attend to on that day.

In an interview from Kitwe, Mr Kabwidi said the strike, which started with Kitwe and Chingola, had spread to Ndola, Luanshya and Kalulushi.

He said the provincial leadership was, however, working together with NEC to resolve the strike.

Mr Kabwidi said the members had indicated that they did not want NEC to make appeals for them to call off the strike through the press.

He said they were planning to start going around the districts tomorrow, and, hopefully, the striking teachers would resume work in order to give Government time to address their grievances.

Mr Kabwidi said their tour of districts was on the premise that NEC would have met Dr Kanganja before they could approach the striking teachers.

Meanwhile, BUPE CHISHIMBA reports that Chingola Secondary School teachers have agreed to resume work tomorrow, but have threatened to withdraw labour again if Government does not respond to their grievances by May 29.

SESTUZ district chairman for Chingola, Collins Mambwe, said in a statement that the teachers teach for one week during which time they expect the national union leadership and Government to come up with realistic solutions to their grievances.

The teachers made the resolution to resume work at a district general meeting.