Labour Watch - Minister of Education Omar Razzaz on Saturday announced the ministry’s decision to require all private schools across the Kingdom to transfer the teachers’ salaries to their bank accounts, aiming to ensure that all schools adhere to the regulations stipulated by the collective agreement on the working conditions of teachers.
The decision will come into effect at the beginning of the next academic year, according to the minister, “this decision will end the loopholes that are currently being used by a few schools to deny teachers their basic rights and hold them ‘hostages’ to their arbitrary decisions — so we [the Ministry of Education] are keen to put this into action”.
Al-Razzaz stressed that they stand with private sector teachers to obtain all their rights, including ensuring that they are paid not paid lower than the minimum wage of 220 dinars. Explaining that "the Ministry took on the responsibility and in coordination with the Ministry of Labor and the Social Security Corporation and the Central Bank and a number of concerned institutions to adopt these rights.",
The announcement came during a meeting organised by the Stand Up with the Teacher campaign, where over 60 teachers called on the Ministry of Education to take measures against the violations committed by several private schools regarding the salaries of their employees.
“Getting our salaries transferred to our bank accounts or electronic wallets is the only way for us [teachers] to prove it when a violation is committed,” co-founder of the campaign Nareeman Shawaeen said stressing that “when no data is available, schools can force us to sign our resignation during the summer months or deny us our right to social security — not to mention that most of us receive salaries way below the minimum wage”.
Shawaeen pointed out that the campaign carried out a survey where over 1,300 teachers participated, which showed that 94.5 per cent of the teachers would prefer their salary to be transferred to their bank accounts, while 67 per cent responded that they don’t get it transferred due to decisions taken by the school.
“The collective agreement on the working conditions of teachers requires schools to transfer the salaries to a bank account unless the workers express their desire not to do so,” the activist said, criticising that “the survey proves that several schools are violating the rights of their teachers”.
“We held ourselves accountable and took the necessary measures to provide the ministry with data to prove the situation, and now, we thank the minister for standing by our side and supporting us with his decisions,” Shawaeen concluded.