Overview:
Haiti’s Prime Minister Alix Fils-Aimé and Schooling Minister Augustin Antoine failed to fulfill public faculty lecturers’ calls for for higher pay, medical health insurance, and free scorching meals. In consequence, the lecturers’ strike has entered its third consecutive week.
PORT-AU-PRINCE — Staff unions met with Prime Minister Alix Fils-Aimé and Schooling Minister Augustin Antoine on Jan. 19 in Port-au-Prince to debate public faculty lecturers’ calls for amid an ongoing strike. Nonetheless, the assembly didn’t resolve the difficulty, and the strike continues, union representatives mentioned.
“The solutions they gave us didn’t fulfill us,” mentioned Josué Merilien, common coordinator of the Unitary Central of Staff of the Public and Non-public Sectors of Haiti (UNNOH), in a WhatsApp message to The Haitian Occasions.
“We requested them to shortly evaluation our ebook of calls for and are available again with concrete options,” Merilien added.
A second closed-door assembly was scheduled for later that night, however particulars in regards to the final result haven’t been made public. Merilien didn’t reply to interview requests in regards to the second assembly, and the Ministry of Schooling declined to remark.
Years of strikes, little progress
For years, Haiti’s public staff, together with lecturers, well being staff, and clerks, have gone on strike to demand higher pay and dealing circumstances. The federal government has persistently failed to reply with urgency, additional destabilizing a rustic already grappling with poverty and instability.
In recent times, well being employee strikes have pressured pregnant ladies to provide beginning outdoors hospitals, whereas justice system strikes have paralyzed courts. Lecturers have gone on strike a number of occasions, disrupting faculty schedules and leaving college students ill-prepared for exams. In 2024, for instance, fewer than 47% of scholars in Haiti’s Northern Division handed their Twelfth-grade state exams, largely attributable to faculty closures attributable to strikes and gang violence.
Lecturers’ calls for
Public faculty lecturers are demanding wage changes to deal with disparities amongst completely different communes and to maintain up with rising residing prices in Haiti. On common, lecturers earn between 18,000 gourdes ($137) and 20,000 gourdes ($150) monthly, and the federal government is commonly a number of funds behind.
The lecturers’ calls for embrace:
- Wage changes and well timed funds
- Medical insurance
- Debit playing cards for simpler entry to salaries
- Free scorching meals for each lecturers and college students
- Full-time hiring for lecturers who’ve been working for years with out official standing
College students out of faculty, protests escalate
The strike, which started on Jan. 6, has closed public faculties in cities throughout Haiti, together with Cap-Haïtien, Limonade, Port-au-Prince, Jérémie, Gonaïves, Miragoâne, and Jacmel. College students have been protesting frequently, demanding their lecturers return to work.
In Limonade, college students marched with leaves—a conventional image of protest—all through town on Jan. 20.
“We will’t discover our lecturers,” one scholar mentioned throughout the protest.
Elsewhere, protests have turned chaotic. Final week, in Miragoâne, public faculty college students clashed with non-public faculty college students who refused to hitch their demonstrations, hurling glass bottles and rocks at each other, based on Le Nouvelliste.
A fruitless assembly with key absences
The Jan. 19 assembly included unions from the Unitary Central of Staff of the Public and Non-public Sectors of Haiti (CUTRASEPH), which incorporates UNNOH. The precise variety of unions in attendance is unknown.
Merilien mentioned that they had anticipated representatives from the Nationwide Faculty Canteen Program (PNCS) to deal with the demand for decent meals and from the Work Accident, Illness, and Maternity Insurance coverage (OFATMA) to debate medical health insurance. Nonetheless, neither group attended.
The assembly had initially been scheduled for Jan. 24, however lecturers pushed for an earlier date, citing the urgency of the state of affairs. The Jan. 19 assembly, nevertheless, ended with out decision.
In earlier strikes, unions have reportedly ended protests after their leaders got larger posts within the training sector. This time, lecturers say they won’t return to work till their calls for are absolutely met.
Dad and mom pissed off by extended strike
Dad and mom, a lot of whom have already paid tuition for the second trimester, expressed frustration with the continuing strike.
“I wish to see my little one working,” mentioned Alius Aluter, whose 14-year-old daughter attends Sainte-Philomène Excessive Faculty in Cap-Haïtien. “The State must give you an answer. If persons are working, they should receives a commission.”
For now, the strike exhibits no indicators of ending, leaving college students out of the classroom and oldsters demanding solutions.