The strike by technical workers at Pristina’s primary and secondary schools, which began on September 1, will continue until all financial obligations to them have been settled. Jusuf Azemi, head of the Private Sector Workers’ Union, said this at a news conference.
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The strike was prompted by the failure to pay workers at upper secondary schools for July and August. Meanwhile, workers at primary schools have still not received their August salaries or payment for 11 days of work in July.
Azemi said that a meeting had been held on the issue with Arianit Elshani, director of the Education Directorate of the Municipality of Pristina, and municipal official Arben Gashi. According to him, the union had expected the meeting to produce a solution to end the deadlock.
He said that, for August, there had been a possibility of paying the workers 391 euros, or 425 euros gross. The justification given was that the minimum wage had not been amended and that, when the contracts were signed, the contractors had set the amount at 425 euros.
According to Azemi, the Education Directorate had said it needed to allocate and transfer these funds. However, the union rejected the offer on the grounds that it did not represent the full salary stipulated in the contract and conflicted with the minimum wage under the law in force.
Based on their contracts and the minimum wage, these workers’ salary is 500 euros gross.
The union leader said that the Municipality did not need to transfer a single cent unless it settled all its obligations to the workers. He explained that any money deposited into their accounts would be withdrawn, but this would not solve the problem, and the strike would end only after the Municipality of Pristina fulfilled all its obligations to them.
Azemi criticized municipal officials for failing to address the problem, despite the union having, according to him, warned for more than a month that the situation could end in a deadlock. He attributed the situation to a lack of resources and a failure to acknowledge reality.
He said that some officials of the Municipality of Pristina had claimed they were unaware that the workers were on strike. Azemi described it as serious that salaries had been missing for 45 days, while the officials responsible for handling workers’ payments were unaware of the strike.
Seeking understanding from citizens and students, Azemi said that the institutions were responsible for the situation because, according to him, they had failed to fulfill their obligations to the workers.
For now, the union intends to continue only with the strike and is not planning more radical action. However, Azemi did not rule out using such measures if the financial obligations are not met, although he expressed confidence that it would not be necessary to go that far.
He said that the institutions had no choice but to act, because workers could not endanger children’s health by sending them to school sick because of people who were well paid to perform their duties.
KosovaPress requested a response from the Education Directorate of the Municipality of Pristina on the issue, but had not received one by the time the article was published.
