The Education Union warns Government: Salaries or union action are not ruled out

Education Union Chairman Nundman Jasharaj said that among their main demands is the rising wages.

He said the union is ready for dialogue with Government, but also for union action, not excluding it either in this context or in the strike.

We have no government. Thus, both with the Law for Union Organization and the Law of Strikes must first be tried with dialogue. If the dialogue has no result in union action. The SBASK is prepared for both dialogue and union action, but is awaiting institution formation, more specifically, of the Government, of the Education Ministry. The most urgent demand is collective contract, because we and other sectors do not have collective contracts, because the Labour Law is said to be signing the collective contract every three years. In this situation we are from rare cases in Kosovo where there is neither collective agreement, dialogue nor collective contract”, Jasharaj said.

Among the main demands of the Education Union are the increase in salaries, better school conditions, and the security of school textbooks in time from first to ninth grade.

The newly existing “institutions will be the collective contract, the signing by us and the Minister of Education. It is normal that we will ask for larger salaries because we are left behind with our colleagues in Montenegro, Macedonia and Albania. We will insist on working conditions because we cannot achieve what is needed. The teachers are committed, but with their conditions they cannot achieve the desired goals. Working conditions require greater commitment of the government and the state. Share tools to have schools of the 21st century, not of the past century, with soles and foam, and with texts that are constantly delayed”, he added.

Jasharaj demanded that institutions be more engaged so that schools in Kosovo are worthy of the 21st century, rather than conditions of the past.

We're going to engage with the new ministry so that textbooks can become like we used to and our books are in school in the first week of September and have new books from first to ninth grade. If we don't have laptops for students, at least have new books for all students”, she told EO, Jashar.