By Isaac Salima:
As the country was holding Labour Day activities Wednesday, some secondary school teachers who were promoted in February this year were lamenting government’s delays to start paying them their new perks.
Early this year, government promoted secondary and primary school teachers.
However, some of the secondary school teachers confided in us that they are still receiving salaries that apply to those in lower grades.
“We were expecting to start receiving the new salaries within two months because some of us received letters of promotion in February.
“However, we are still waiting for the new perks up to now,” said one of the teachers, who spoke on behalf of 12 other teachers he was with.
He further said some of the colleagues are yet to get their promotion arrears, dating back April 2022.
“This is demotivating because we celebrated when we received the letters of promotion but now, three months later, we have not touched the new salaries. We were happy with the promotions because the cost of living is high and we thought that we would, at least, break even financially,” he added.
Ministry of Education spokesperson Mphatso Nkuonera said that the teachers will get their money once all the processes are completed.
Meanwhile, quality education activist Benedicto Kondowe has described the development as demotivating.
“It is not on that the ministry should be delaying salary processing. Our view is that when the promotions were being made, government should have factored the adjustments in its financial plans. Employees are expected to get paid for what they have worked for and what they are getting is not what they have been working for,” Kondowe said.
