‘…If these demands are not met by 15 February 2016 we will mobilize our members and fellow workers in the civil service to flood the streets of Bulawayo and Harare on 26 February 2016 and completely shut down the key operations of this government…’
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Government must stop playing games with workers

26 January 2016
Revelations coming in the media which show that a raft of measures would be introduced targeting the education sector, which among other things include non-payment of salaries during the holiday months of April, August and December and the cutting of payment for schools that achieve less than 50% pass rate, are a cause for serious concern to teachers.
The Rural Teachers Union of Zimbabwe (RTUZ) wishes to warn President Mugabe’s increasingly desperate government to stop forthwith playing mind games with teachers and government workers in general at a time when they are failing to meet their obligations as employers.
It is common cause that Zimbabwe is ranked first in Africa in terms of literacy and is also making significant progress on the human development index front.
That Zimbabwe is so highly ranked is less a product of sound schools with world class infrastructure, adequate text books and other learning materials, it is instead a product of the ingenuity of Zimbabwean teachers especially those stationed in remote rural areas.
Zimbabwe’s much acclaimed academic prowess comes from the selfless dedication of men and women who live in houses without windows, with broken roofs and often times lack basic potable water supply.
These heroes of Zimbabwe’s famed education system wake up in the small hours of the morning to write their lesson plans and scheme books under candle light and even write lengthy notes on chalk boards long before the start of their working day at 0730hrs.
If anything the Zimbabwean government has only ensured that their misery is multiplied through token budgetary support and outright insults. The government is yet to pay annual bonuses for the teachers, it is yet to construct habitable living quarters in 2500 schools, it is yet to rationalize the pupil to text book ratio which is currently at 1:30 and in the midst of all this it has the audacity to talk of austerity in the education sector.
The education sector is still fragile after the great collapse of 2008 and if anything the post 2013 administration has reversed the little gains made during the GNU. Various policy pronouncements have had the effect of working to push the education sector towards complete catastrophe and this only work to further disadvantage those in rural areas.
RTUZ is aware that the Ministry of Primary and Secondary Education has distanced itself from the proposed policy position but the union is not naïve to the operations of this regime. This government has the tendency of indicating left and turning right and it will not be shocking if in April teachers receive only allowances without salaries.
Thus as a union we have given the regime up to the 15th of February 2016 to sought their mess and pay bonuses to all government workers, cease forthwith the 7.5% pension deduction until salaries are above PDL and stop implementation of all austerity related policy positions.
If these demands are not met by 15 February 2016 we will mobilize our members and fellow workers in the civil service to flood the streets of Bulawayo and Harare on 26 February 2016 and completely shut down the key operations of this government.
As RTUZ we are aware that this government does not respect its workers and let alone their representatives hence our intention to exercise our constitutionally guaranteed right to demonstrate and petition.
RTUZ also takes this opportunity to offer its solidarity to the move by the Zimbabwe Teachers Association (ZIMTA) and the Civil Service Employees Association for taking the government to court over two critical matters.
ZIMTA is challenging the government’s policy pronouncement of recalling all teachers who had applied and had been granted vacation leave while the Civil Service Employees Association is challenging the constitutionality of the discriminative maternity leave provisions in the Labour Act.
As a union we fully support the initiatives by the two sister unions as they are in the best interest of workers, further we believe that we must march separately and strike together and such actions show that we indeed are striking together.
Shinga Mushandi Shinga! Qina Sisebenzi Qina!
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