Gambia: School teachers on strike for lack of salary

Seventeen teachers at Fatoto Upper Basic and Senior Secondary School embarked on a two-day industrial sit-down strike over lack of payment of their double-shift allowance.

The teachers of the school in Fatoto, Upper River Region, were in school but refused to get into their classrooms to teach on Thursday and Friday claiming they have not received their double-shift allowance since September 2012. 

About five hundred students are affected in the said strike.

A teacher on double shift in government school in the country earns 50 per cent more of his monthly salary for additional shift taken. 

A qualified teacher with Higher Teachers Certificate of the Gambia College at a government school earns about D3,000 per month as basic salary, and other allowances depend on the location – whether urban or rural – of the teacher.

“We are absolutely dissatisfied with the lack of payment of our double-shift salary since September 2012 and no official reason has been given for this,” an aggrieved teacher, who wished not be named, said.

However, the industrial action of the teachers yielded dividend as the school authorities swiftly intervened to resolve the matter. 

The teachers will now resume teaching today, Monday, as they have reached an agreement with the school authorities that the payment of their double-shift allowance will start end of this month, March 2013.

Initially, the teachers said they were ready to continue the sit-down strike until the authorities are ready to resolve their concerns.

Foundation ‘Gambia Speelt Mee’ donates playgrounds to 15 schools in Gambia

A Dutch project ‘Gambia Speelt Mee’, which means ‘Gambia Plays Along’, has donated playground equipments and stationeries to about 15 nursery and primary schools in various regions across The Gambia.

The project started in 2010 and it was initiated by Bert Min, a successful Dutch businessman who owns a video production company called TBMVISUALS Professional Video Experience, in Holland.

Mr Min said the initiative to build and offer playground equipments - such as swings, climbing-frame, and seesaws - to various schools in The Gambia came after visiting the country in 2010. 

“Once back in Holland it became very clear that children in Holland have little to worry about, they own a lot of stuff they do not even really need,” Mr Min said while noting that children in the Gambia most of the time do not even have the essential. 

Other than a game of football on a dusty field, there is no real possibility for entertainment, he observed.

It is in cognizant of this that Mr Min made some plan and drawings of various playground toys, modeled after Dutch example and decided to travel to The Gambia again.   This time he was armed with some necessary documents to start a project to create more fun for the schoolchildren. 

This is how Gambia Speelt Mee started in Gambia with its slogan "Together we make it a little more fun".  Mr Min said together with other sponsors, those who made some financial contribution towards the project, the lives of many schoolchildren in the country are “a little better” now.  Personally, he said, I consider it a privilege to spend my donation to realize more fun for the schoolchildren.

“I always feel happy when the children are happy, and this is my biggest motivation to continue with the project,” the initiator of Gambia Speelt Mee said.