CHINEDU WOSU, YENAGOA
Striking Teachers in Bayelsa State Primary Schools on Thursday marked the 2017 World Teachers Day event amidst an ongoing strike embarked upon by school teachers across the state over unpaid salaries and poor working environment.
While marking the World Teachers Day, the teachers rejected Dickson’s request for the suspension of the four-week-old action which they started on August 11.
The event which was marked in a low key fashion, saw Governor Seriake Dickson, represented by the new Commissioner for Education, Jonathan Obuebite, provoked the anger of the teachers when, while delivering his address, he told them that “all your problems are over”.
The aggrieved teachers, in unison, chorused a thunderous “no, no, no, we are tired of working without being paid”.
Chairman, Nigeria Union of Teachers, Bayelsa State, Kalama John Tonpre, in his address, outlined a catalogue of issues which he emphasized were adversely affecting the education sector in the state.
He said that teachers are suffering a backlog of unpaid salaries ranging from nine months to 11 months, adding that the government had not implemented and conducted fresh promotion exercises for teachers since 2013.
Tonpre listed others as non-payment of N18, 000 minimum wage arrears to both primary and secondary teachers, non-payment of duty post allowances, inadequate provision of instructional materials and acute shortage of teachers, among others.
Hear Tonpre “Also of utmost concern to the NUT is the deprivation of teacher-pensioners from enjoying their retirement benefits”.
The chairman called on the teachers to “keep faith with the teaching profession despite the obvious challenges, institutional frustrations, deprivations, and pray the Almighty God to reward you here on earth and later in heaven”.
Dickson, however, assured them that his administration had worked out robust measures to improve their welfare and education infrastructure across the state.
