Day 5 Job Action Update

The struggle for a living wage continues until the employer responds to the root cause of the ongoing industrial action. Teachers are simply demanding interbank rate indexed salaries from treasury to sustain our livelihoods. On Monday the 14th of October as the Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe, ARTUZ we called for a job action as a way of pressuring the employer to respond to our demand for a living wage. We are overwhelmed by the response of teachers from the four corners of Zimbabwe. We have gathered information from our respective district and provincial leadership that about 38% of Zimbabwean teachers have withdrawn their labour we expect an increase in the number of teachers taking part in the job action. A total of 45973 individual teachers participated in the job action which is a big improvement from the 10 200 who participated in the February job action. The graph below shows the statistics we have gathered from different schools around Zimbabwe.

ARTUZ will continue mobilizing more teachers and the broader working class to join the struggle. It’s so disgusting that the majority of teachers are earning an average sum of RTGS1000 which is not even enough to cover the basics commodities to sustain a family of five people for a month. Below is a list of prices of the basic commodities against the RTGS1000:

  • Bread – RTGS$15.75- $900 for two loaves per day per month
  • 2L c/oil – RTGS$60 – $120 for four liters per month
  • 2kg w/powder – RTGS$80 $160 for 4kg per month
  • 10kg m/meal – RTGS$60 – $120 for 20 kg per month

The above list shows the prices of a very few basic commodities without mentioning other life needs such as health care services, funeral cover, transport costs and accommodation among others. The situation is unbearable and detrimental to the teacher status therefore we urge all teachers to join the industrial action and fight for what belongs to us.

We salute the Zimbabwe Hospital Doctors Association, ZHDA, Zimbabwe Postal workers, the broader Civil service under APEX and all Cdes from the broad spectrum of the working class who are fighting against the neoliberal austerity measures.

We call upon the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions ZCTU to call for a national action against austerity.

Source: Amalgamated Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (ARTUZ)

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