CTTU strike planned

[TamilNet, Monday, 15 November 1999, 07:23 GMT]
The Ceylon Tamil Teachers' Union (CTTU) has alerted its members in the north-east province to be prepared to stage a one-day token strike on January 7 next year, putting forward the nine demands which have not been met by the education authorities, so far.

The General Secretary of the CTTU, Mr. T. Mahasivam said that several rounds of discussions were held between the union and the high officials of the Ministry of Education and Higher Education in the past regarding the nine demands. These demands included the withdrawal of the textbooks currently used by Tamil medium students and printing new textbooks prepared with the help of Tamil scholars.

He added that while during those discussions, ministry officials gave several promises, the authorities had kept not a single promise. The bureaucrats have ignored the directions given by the minister concerned.

Mr. Mahasivam said that the CTTU has now been forced to launch a trade union struggle once again to win its nine demands. He added that January 07 has been fixed as the date to launch the trade union struggle. On that day, all teachers in the north-east province would send sick notes and boycott schools.