A nationwide strike was carried out yesterday by school teachers in Sudan to demand an increase in spending on education and the minimum wage, improvement of teaching conditions and the school environment, and prompt overdue salary payments.
The one-day strike is part of the escalation campaign announced by the Sudanese Teachers' Committee, in response to a “partial response” by the authorities to stop the strike, according to Duriya Babikir, a leader of the Teachers Committee. Earlier this month, the Service Affairs Bureau announced an increase in teachers’ wages by six per cent.
Babikir told Radio Dabanga that the strike on Tuesday will be followed by the complete closure of government schools on Thursday, and next week on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday.
The Sudanese Teachers Committee condemned the statements of the acting Minister of Education, Mahmoud Sirelkhitim, who has threatened to dismiss striking teachers.
Kamaria Omar, member of the Sudanese Teachers’ Committee, told Radio Dabanga that the federal Ministry of Education has nothing to do with financial remunerations.
“The responsibility for wages is a major state matter,” she said. “Teachers will abide by the announced strike schedule during the month of December until all their demands are met.”
Students of a number of schools in Ed Damazin, capital of Blue Nile region, demonstrated against increases in tuition fees. According to the students, school fees have doubled since last year, now at SDG10,000.
The Blue Nile region Minister of Education, Ishraga Jibril, said that the ministry has no hand in determining the tuition fees. Fees are proposed by individual schools to manage their expenses. On Tuesday, she said that the ministry instructed all school administrations to avoid expelling any student if they have not managed to pay tuition fees or buy school uniforms.
In Nyla, South Darfur, the Ministry of Education suspended studies at all educational levels for an indefinite period in the interest of the safety of teachers, students, pupils, children, and citizens’ property. The announcement noted that this is especially in response to the “emergence of lawlessness and attacks on schools and other educational institutions” in the state.
Recently, the Sudan office of the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) has expressed serious concerns about prolonged learning disruption in Sudan. The UN agency stressed that finding mutual solutions to keep schools open is vital to ending the education crisis and preventing the loss of education for an entire generation of Sudanese children.
About 6.9 million girls and boys, one in three school-aged children, do not go to school in Sudan, UNICEF and Save the Children in Sudan reported in a joint press statement on September 12.
* USD 1 = SDG 448.74 at the time of publishing this article. As effective foreign exchange rates can vary in Sudan, Radio Dabanga bases all SDG currency conversions on the daily US Dollar rate quoted by the Central Bank of Sudan (CBoS).
Primary school girl plays in front of school in Mayo in southern Khartoum (Photo: Sari Omer / UNICEF)
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