Govt Reacts to Demands of Stricking Teachers

By Lamin B. Darboe

The teaching fraternity in The Gambia, through the Gambia Teachers’ Union (GTU), has announced that it is embarking on a sit-down strike throughout the country due to what it felt is government’s failure to address  its demands.

In response, the Government, through the Ministry of Public Service, Administrative Reforms, Policy Coordination & Delivery, called on the GTU executive to reconsider their decision and resume work with immediate effect, accusing them of taking such decision without due notification to their employer, Gambia Government.

Among others, the Teacher’s Union complained about “inconsistencies in the payment of allowances to the education sector personnel since the introduction of the 30% salary increment last year”.

The Government said it had come to know about the sit-down strike through social media. “Based on our records and given the numerous holidays during the period, the GTU letter only came to the attention of the Permanent Secretary, PMO on December 30, 2022,” indicated the press statement by Public Service Ministry.

The Ministry said upon the receipt of their letter, it made several attempts, by phone calls to GTU executive on the matter, “but they categorically stated that they cannot entertain any discussion”.

Bellow is the highlight of the demands by the teachers and government’s responses/clarifications:

On the issue of 30% salary increment on zonal allowances: Government clarified to GTU executive that to fund the 30% salary increment; it embarked on expenditure cuts across MDAs. The other measure was to delink percentage based allowances from basic salary. Such allowances include provincial allowance, hardship allowance, among others. This is a government-wide policy not specific to MoBSE.

“With the National Assembly approval of the supplementary appropriation budget for the year 2022 it went on, provincial allowance for the zones as presented under General Orders 05305 was superseded. In this regard, the said allowance was converted to absolute values based on the 2019 version of the Integrated Pay Scale. It further clarified that that the payment of provincial allowances to staff in other ministries is following the same formula.

On Hard-To-Reach Allowance: According to Government, the proposed arrangement on the management or implementation of Hard-To-Reach Allowance which was presented to MoBSE was discussed with them at length and a response was given to that effect vie PMO letter reference PMO 37/207/01/Temp I/(116) dated May 5, 2022.

Likewise this allowance it went to justify that with the delinking of the percentage based allowance from basic salary,  the percentage that civil servants were receiving before the 30% salary increase were converted to absolute values using the 2019 version of the Integrated Pay Scale.

On Double-shift-Allowance: Government says the concern is noted, that the matter is being reviewed and that all stakeholders will be informed in due course of the outcome of the review.

On Committee-Sitting-Allowance: It clarified that as part of the government wide policy taken to support the implementation of the 2022 revised budget, Committee Allowance for all ministries were frozen; thus this freezing is in effect being applied across all MDAs.

On Invigilation fee for WASSCE and GABECE:“It has been brought to the Government attention that during WASSCE and GABECE invigilators are usually staff of the schools where the exams are taking place and the invigilation periods are conducted during school working hours for which they are paid salaries. Therefore, the proposal to pay invigilation fee for work being done in lieu of teaching cannot be justified,” it pointed out.

About Charge-Allowance/Categorisation of Schools, Government advised GTU executive to note that Charge-Allowance are payable where the engagements are formalised. “Therefore, whenever an officer is performing part of the duties of a higher post the said officer is entitled to charge allowance and the necessary approval should be sought from the PSC through PMO”.

However, with regards to the classification of schools, government said it has been brought to its attention that some of the schools especially those in the rural areas are not yet classified and therefore high level positions are not budgeted for those schools.  In this case it added, teachers who are put in charge of those schools cannot claim such allowances for positions which are not budgeted for.

Finally, about 05304-Relocation-Allowance, Government urged GTU executive to note that the payment of this allowance is an entitlement to all civil servants and that staff affected need to apply for the processing of the payment.