Teachers strike against non-payment in eastern Sudan

The teachers’ committee in Sudan’s El Gezira state called-out a strike on Tuesday in various localities because of the delay in payment of their salaries for the month of October. This strike is yet another in a wave of teachers’ strikes that have occurred over the past months throughout Sudan.

A leader of the teachers’ committee told Radio Dabanga that the local authorities did not pay their salaries for September until October 20.

The teacher response rate for the strike was only 50 per cent however he said the committee would continue to mobilise the teachers to scale-up the strike in order to pressure the local governments to speed-up payment of the salaries.

Wave of strikes

The last months have seen a wave of strikes by teachers of non-payment of salaries across Sudan.

On October 22, teachers of the basic and higher secondary schools in Bindisi in Central Darfur entered into a strike in protest against the non-payment of their salaries for three months in a row.

One of the teachers told Radio Dabanga at the time: “The strike will last for a week, and if salaries are not paid before next Monday, we will continue to strike until our salaries are paid.”

Teachers in Wad Banda locality, west of El Obeid in West Kordofan, laid-down their toolson Ocrober 21. They also protest the absence of payments of their salaries for the month of September.

The head of one of the workers’ union in the locality, Muhidin Ahmed, said that they would start a larger strike the next Wednesday in the event that the salaries are not paid today.

Also, civil servants, teachers, and other employees in West Kordofan’s Abu Zabad locality entered into a three-day strike on October 15, in objection against the non-payment of their dues.

At the same time teachers in El Saleem and El Duba in Northern State, and in South Darfur started a strike with similar motives.

Previously, several work sectors in West Kordofan complained about the non-payment of salaries due to the lack of banks in their localities. In preceding months, teachers’ strikes erupted in Kassala and El Gezira states, against the deteriorated financial and educational situation. Following the holiday of Eid El Adha, teachers demanded the payment of the holiday grants and salary for August. In El Gezira teachers carried out a sit-in in protest against the government’s decision to close more than 200 schools in the state.