COTE D'IVOIRE: TEACHERS RESUME STRIKE

C O N F I D E N T I A L ABIDJAN 000771

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/18/2016
TAGS: PGOV ELAB ASEC KPKO IV
SUBJECT: COTE D'IVOIRE: TEACHERS RESUME STRIKE

REF: A. ABIDJAN 691


B. ABIDJAN 768

Classified By: Poloff Phaedra Gwyn for reason 1.4 b&d


1. (SBU) Primary and secondary school teachers, who suspended
their strike June 20 after meeting with President Gbagbo (ref
A),are threatening to resume the strike July 18. The
teachers said at the time that their demands had not been met
but that they would suspend the strike to allow for further
negotiations. However, even though the Prime Minister
promised to meet two of the teachers' three demands, the
government has taken no action on any of them since June 20.


2. (SBU) The teachers are demanding a housing allowance for
primary school teachers, more opportunities for advancement,
and the creation of an office to assure that teachers will be
promptly paid for proctoring and grading exams. This last
demand is particularly key as the exam season begins. In the
past, it has taken a year or more for teachers to be paid for
proctoring and correcting the exams. This year, they are
demanding that the government agree in advance to set up a
special office at each examination site, where teachers can
collect their payment immediate after they finish. This is
one of the two demands the Prime Minister agreed to meet, but
nothing has been done and now the day of the first exams, the
baccalaureate, has arrived. There has been no official
statement from the government since the teachers announced
July 14 that they would resume the strike.


3. (U) Over 100,000 students were scheduled to start their
oral baccalaureate exams in the government-controlled south
today, July 18, followed by the written portion on July 25.
The Minister of Education decided that students in the New
Forces zone would take their exams separately, in August.
Lower level secondary and primary school exams were scheduled
for later in the summer.


4. (C) Comment: The government has run up arrears to so
many different groups of its citizens that it can ill afford
to give priority to one group over the others. In any case,
the teachers' unions are out of favor with the Education
Minister, who is from President Gbagbo's FPI (Ivoirian
Popular Front) party, because of their strikes and vociferous
protests. In itself the teachers' strike might be a
relatively small distraction against the backdrop of the
worsening national political crisis, but it gave the thuggish
pro-Gbagbo students' union an excuse to attack the premises
of Ivoirian Radio and Television (Ref B) and it is
undermining the Prime Minister. End Comment.
Hooks