Optimistic parties emerge from High Court mediation in teachers’ strike

Last Updated on Friday, 1 March 2024, 14:06 by Denis Chabrol

Lawyers for the Guyana Teachers’ Union (GTU) and the Ministry of Education Friday afternoon emerged from more than two hours of High Court-appointed mediation saying they were hopeful about an end to the now 26-day old strike.

The two sides are due to resume mediation at 2 PM Friday.

GTU’s lawyer, Darren Wade said he and union representatives tabled a proposal to mediators Attorneys-at-Law, Robin Stoby and Edward Luckhoo.

The mediators were tight-lipped about the process. While Mr Wade declined to provide details about the GTU’s proposal, he was confident that the two sides could reach agreement once the government agrees. “I am very optimistic…,” he told reporters, adding that much depended on government’s lawyers receiving responses from the Attorney General Anil Nandlall who has travelled on government business.

Government’s legal representative, Attorney-at-Law Darshan Ramdhani seemed optimistic that the mediation was laying the groundwork for the strike to be called off and for teachers and students to return fully to classrooms in public schools. “We have had a very, I believe, a fruitful session. It is good that the union is ready now to engage the government again so we are hoping that those talks can resume,” he told reporters.

Mr Ramdhani credited the mediators with “doing a good job so far.” “We hope that we will get something to get the teachers back into the school. The government’s main priority is to ensure that the teachers return to the school. That’s where they belong. Our nation’s children should be taught,” he said.

Asked whether he forecast an end to the strike soon, Mr Ramdhani remarked that “We are always reasonable and we hope that reason prevails and that reasonable requests will be met,” he said.

He said the two sides were “still discussing the modality and mechanism on the way forward” rather than derails of the dispute.

The GTU is demanding collective bargaining for increased wages and salaries as a condition for calling off the strike.

The union has submitted a multi-year proposal.

Government is on record as deeming the strike unlawful and politically motivated.

Chief Education Officer Saddam Hussain and GTU President Mark Lyte were the two most senior representatives from both sides in the mediation session.

The GTU is proposing a 25 percent salary increase for 2019, and 20 percent for 2019 to 2023 and an additional performance-based incentive of 2 percent annually of the total teachers’ wage bill to eligible teachers during the period of the multi-year agreement. Further, the union wants a GY$5,000 emotional/ stress/risk allowance; a  monthly Internet allowance of GY$10,000; a GY$10,000 monthly allowance to teachers who use their own vehicles to perform official duties, and a fixed monthly allowance of GY$7,000 for headteachers/principals to conduct business on behalf of their institutions.

Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo had said that if the strike dragged on government would shift to Online learning.

The court-mediation process is an offshoot from case before Justice Sandil Kissoon in which he has temporarily ordered government not to deduct salaries from striking teachers and to continue automatic deduction and remittance union membership dues pending the hearing and determination of the substantive cases.

The GTU returned to the court citing a circular by the Chief Education Officer to all headteachers instructing them to continue recording absented teachers. “To be clear, the orders made by Justice Kissoon are temporary. The government of Guyana will not pay teachers for the days that they did not work. We are advised that a final order is expected to be made accordingly anfc consequently the information collected above will be utilised to determine teachers’ salaries,” Mr Hussain said in his circular dated February 27, 2024.