Teachers suspend strike

Romanian teachers have suspended their all-out strike.

Bogdan Matei, 13.06.2023, 13:50

Pupils went back to school from Tuesday, but only until Friday, when they break off for the 2-month summer holiday. This comes after a forced 3-week holiday as their teachers were on strike. Unprecedented in the last 18 years, the general strike in the Romanian undergraduate education system began on 22nd May and lasted until 12th June, a time teachers spent mostly protesting in the street against the governments salary policy. Their trade union leaders said they decided to suspend the strike after talking to their regional colleagues. The condition, however, was for the government to issue an emergency order stipulating that the basic salary of a beginner teacher is the national average salary.

The governments latest proposal will see teachers salaries go up by around 260 euros as of this month, and that of the non-teaching staff by some 80 euros. Also, from 1st January next year, salaries will further grow based on the new salary law for public sector employees, in two stages, by 50% in 2024 and the rest from 2025. The government also proposed a bonus of some 300 euros for teachers and 100 euros for the non-teaching staff to be granted from 2023 until 2027 on 5th October, on the International Day of Education. If the new salary law does not contain the principles laid down in the emergency order, the strike will be resumed, warned the leaders of two biggest trade union federations in the education system.

Some education employees are, however, unhappy with the decision to suspend the strike. In Suceava, in the north, more than 1,500 people staged a protest on Monday, and many members of a county trade union federation are determined not to go back to teaching and again take to the street in the coming days. Some education employees in Timiş, in the west, are also not happy with the suspension of the strike. The local trade union leader said, however, that he would accept the decision of the majority of his colleagues around the country to go back to work. The news of school reopening was met with relief by 8th and 12th year pupils who will thus be able to take their exams.

Overall, however, the prolonged crisis in the education system invalidates the Educated Romania programme initiated by the Romanian president, himself a former teacher, and which was supposed to crown his ten years in office. (CM)