Dear Editor,
One sadful week has been experimented with and a second week is being sorely examined by the grasping Guyana Teachers’ Union to extract an expected outcome which is expressed as primarily self-serving to a few at the expense of less than half of the nation’s “educators.”
Coming days after the Budget 2024 presentation, examination and passed by Parliament, this trillion-dollar figure is certainly too big for the beaten Opposition to grapple with and handle.
More so, what is driving fear is the repercussion. A well planned and executed premeditation, the strike (strife?) hit the dirt running with the hope of an atomic bomb exploding. Fortunately, the photographs presented do not paint the comprehensive picture. Little wonder the smell of roasting “guinea pigs” is not a challenge to the Saharan dust.
What is worrisome is that, those clamoring for more, fail to recognise or choose to be oblivious, that in only three years of administration, the PPP/C Government has done more for the education system in totality, than their predecessor.
The systemic ramification of logistics and statistics assert the current enjoyed benefits and outweigh the achingly 2015-2020 harangue. What was the accepted settlement which ensued then? The agitated Opposition has always been poor mathematicians.
The question is, to compare or not to compare the teachers’ status versus the Public Service. Don’t public servants also have to eat, dress and travel to work? Don’t they need living quarters too and can utilise duty free allowances?
Perhaps, some teachers want an exquisite class system which is aloof of others. And then, there is the porous call for equality. How quickly some choose to forget and override the plight of the 7,000 sugar workers and their extended families! What was the GTU’s response to the sugar workers’ dilemma in 2016/17 versus the termination of the 90 plus bauxite workers in 2019?
Is it fair to analyze the contributions from perhaps some of the striking educators as against their escalated compensation over the past few years in terms of increased performance? Perhaps, this will be too presumptuous and should not be entertained.
Are the teachers giving real value as required? Why is the passing rate so alarming? Who is answerable? The Minister or the Head Master/Mistress or those in charge of the class rooms? Is this opening a can of worms? Are we revisiting the blame game of pointing fingers?
Guyanese are well acquainted with “do as I say and not as I do.” How morally questionable should the ring leaders be? The Opposition has been great pace setters in convulsion. They have taken us down the distressed road of 33 years of doom and gloom, bankruptcy, corruption, expert mismanagement, racism and violence.
The long arms of the PNC’s tentacles are wrapped around some trade unions with their warped ideas and ideals. There is an obvious behavioural pattern which is apparently executed and exercised by the misled educated advocates.
Breaking up the one-day strike by the Clerical and Commercial Workers Union in the 1980’s over the “too many lines in a non-aligned country,” is a classic example of brute, force and ignorance, extolled by Burnham and his army of violent and murderous sycophants. Father Darke was brutally murdered while innocently taking pictures. Famous Guyanese reporter, Ricky Singh, had to run for his life from this country.
Teargassing and shooting GAWU members in the 1960’s was a norm by the blood thirsty regime who was out to quell the cry of proletariats. Alice was crushed to death at Leonora. The elders whose hands are stained, now teach and preach while governed with volcanic and revolting conscience! But the GTU has nothing of the sort to worry about from the PPP/C Government.
COVID-19 enforced a revolutionary approach to the ongoing teaching system by the PPP/C Government. The Ministry of Education remains challenged to parallel an advanced and modern technology, embraced by global enhancements. They have been recognized for their sterling performance in this advent. How many of the striking educators can claim to be contributing factors to this success? Are the teachers responsible for molding students who top the Caribbean in classes or in the streets?
These days, the word sacrifice has a different meaning or none perhaps. How many teachers remain genuinely motivated toward their duties? It is not a case where their reasonable demands have been ignored by the ever-caring Government. More than 50% have been fulfilled. When teachers allow themselves to be misguided, misrepresented and mistaken, then, they become students of a different caliber.
Guyana’s portion of the oil revenue was reduced to 14.5 % by the Opposition who negotiated a lopsided contract. The PPP/C Government is not responsible for this quandary. Guyana will not become a Dubai overnight. A careful, collective and calculated government will not go on a spending spree and empty the Treasury like the PNC would want to do.
Differentiating between want and need has to be a tempered and practical approach by any meticulous economics teacher. That is why the government has to be the prudent teacher, taking some degree of precaution and not become an enabler of disaster.
The art of teaching enriches the gift of love, compassion and understanding. It encompasses an articulation for communication.
Choosing this field is rewarding, not only monetary. Is there any teacher who can really compare their situation with an ordinary cane cutter? Innocent students have exams to prepare for. They are caught between a rock and a hard place. It’s time to look at the glass as half full and not half empty!
Yours respectfully,
Jai Lall.
