Pay day day now a mourning day for teachers: PTUZ

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The president of the Progressive Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (PTUZ), Dr Takavafira Zhou has urged the government to address the plight of teachers whom he said have been reduced to mourning on payday.

In a statement this Tuesday, Zhou said in addition to the fact that teachers’ salaries are not enough, there are delays in paying them. He said:

Today, a day teachers should have been visiting banks and accessing their pay, they have been reduced into national mourning. The majority of teachers have suffered heavy deductions and their bank balances indicate salaries ranging from $360 to $10,000. Worse still teachers have not been timeously receiving their payslips for the past two months and they are left wondering what these heavy deductions are emanating from.

Is it coming from loan sharks trying to recover their money following govt ban of loans, is it deductions from February incapacitation, is it an increase of funeral policies and medical aid services, is it from the one-armed banditry Gems deduction etc, teachers wonder?

Whatever it may be emanating from, there is no doubt that teachers are taken for a ride, and must collectively act together to end this insult and assault on their livelihoods.

There is an urgent need for individual teachers to visit the nearest SSB sub-offices for an explanation, and convey that to their respective Unions. We also urge SSB and the line Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education to timeously provide teachers with their payslips.

It is imperative for teacher unions to meet urgently and chat a way forward, more so in light of the inundation of Union offices by teachers with complaints and flooding of the Union district, provincial and national chat groups with complaints.

This assault on teachers’ pay comes at a critical juncture govt has continued to unilaterally deduct GEMs money from teachers who have long opted out, and teachers are struggling to pay exorbitant school fees and exam fees. Worse still govt promise to assist teachers to pay school fees for their children is proving to be elusive and evasive. Teachers are their own liberators from slave wages and assault on their livelihoods.

––Dr Takavafira M. Zhou is PTUZ President