An ongoing three-month strike by 37,000 contract teachers in Niger threatens recent gains toward meeting the country’s Millennium Development Goal (MDG) of universal primary education, according to teachers’ union leaders who addressed the media in Niamey on March 26.
A skeletal staff of 7,000 public (permanent) teachers is keeping schools open part-time while their colleagues on short-term contracts — who on average earn half as much — continue to strike over benefits. While teachers who are considered state employees earn up to $240 (Rs.12,000) per month, contract teachers earn at most $160 (Rs.8,000) according to the National Contract Teachers’ Union (NCTU).
Oubandoma Salissou, a spokesperson of the Democratic Union of Public Workers which represents state employees, including the 7,000 public teachers, says that if the reduced staff cannot cover enough of the curriculum by the year-end exam and students are not able to advance to the next grade, Niger will lose ground in its quest to universalise education. “The situation with Nigerien schools is thorny. It will be difficult to save this school year,” says Salissou. Students currently attend two days of classes per week, given the reduced staff.
Meanwhile, the percentage of school-age children enroled in primary school has increased to 53.5 percent in 2006, from a mere 25 percent in 1990. Of those enroled, 40 percent successfully graduated to secondary education, which is more than double the rate some 20 years ago, according to government sources. In the previous school year, 1.3 million students, or 57 percent of the primary school-age population, attended primary school.
“We have been left on our own,” says secondary student Abdoulaye Ousseini (18). “Many of our classmates have signed up to continue their studies in private schools in Niamey, where the average price of tuition is $240 (Rs.12,000) per year.” Against this, the average wage in Niger is equivalent to $280 (Rs.14,000) for the year, according to World Bank data.
For five days starting on March 16, students protesting the teachers’ strike erected barricades, blocked routes and burned tyres until police dispersed them. The head of NCTU, Moukaila Halidou, says that the government has not respected earlier agreements to increase benefits and transition contract workers to the better-paying public contracts after four years of service.
But education minister Mamadou Samba, addressing a press conference on March 22, said that the state is short of the almost $23 million (Rs.115 crore) needed to pay benefits because it has hired three times as many contract workers — more than 6,000 teachers — than budgeted. He did not provide any plan to raise the funds.
Union leader Halidou says negotiations over benefits are stalled. Year-end exams are scheduled for June 18-21.
(Excerpted and adapted from www.irinnews.org)