Sudan’s School Teachers Strike, Again

Today marks the third day of a new nationwide teacher strike by public school employees. Less than two weeks after announcing a breakthrough in negotiations with the authorities, the Sudanese Teachers’ Committee (STC) decided to suspend operations on Sunday.

According to Sami El Bager, a spokesperson for the STC, who spoke to Radio Dabanga, the teachers are currently on strike to protest the delay in receiving their January and February salaries.

“Several teachers didn’t get these dues until March middle. It’s unacceptable that others didn’t, he said. Since the wages are so inadequate to meet the needs of the average family, it creates significant problems for teachers and their families. 

Therefore, we decided on Sunday to ask all state teachers to stop working until the backlog of salaries is cleared up.

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El Bager added that the Finance Ministry disregarded the agreements made regarding the rights of teachers with the special committee established by the Sovereign Council. “The ministry broke its promises to begin paying the teachers’ past-due fees and a bonus on Sunday.

So that “we, as teachers, do not have to enter into another confrontation,” he urged the Ministry of Finance to uphold the terms of the agreement.

Let’s see the matter of the conflict Sudan’s School Teachers Strike-

The STC announced a partial strike in all of Sudan’s states in March of last year after the Finance Ministry failed to accede to their demands for the minimum wage increase, a reform of the salary structure, the payment of back pay and allowances, and an improved working environment.

The Committee called on all teachers to close the primary, middle, and secondary government schools in the nation from January 8 until January 28 after talks with the Finance Minister “reached a dead end” in mid-December. More than 16,000 government schools in Sudan took part in the strike.

A month into the strike, Sheikh El Reyeh Azrag Teiba, the leader of the Sudanese branch of the El Gadiriya Sufi sect, and several politicians suggested mediating between the teachers and the authorities.

Jibril Ibrahim, the minister of finance, reacted by promising to pay the late fees by February 12 after the Sovereignty Council established a special mediation committee, but he was unable to commit to raising the minimum wage. But by that time, the ministry had not fulfilled its commitment. Teachers began to question the sincerity of the ministry’s commitments as a result, leading some to call them “political fraud.”

To support ongoing negotiations, the STC announced a temporary strike suspension at the end of February. As a gesture of goodwill, the suspension was prolonged in the middle of March and once more at the start of April. The STC stated that the new commitments from the Finance Ministry were a breakthrough and that “what is agreed upon is moving in the direction of implementation.”