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News > Latin America

Argentina: Teachers' Unions Begin 48-Hour Strike Against Macri Policies

  • Teachers Unions in Argentina protest during a strike earlier this month on July 10, 2018.

    Teachers Unions in Argentina protest during a strike earlier this month on July 10, 2018. | Photo: Norberto Noto

Published 30 July 2018
Opinion

"There is a national project of deterioration of public education," said in a press conference Eduardo Lopez, Secretary-General of the Workers of Education Union (UTE).

Teachers unions in Argentina have started a 48 hours strike to demand better working conditions and the reinstallment of "paritarias" (meetings between the government and unions in order to establish salary increases according to the inflation rate), which were suspended by the neoliberal policies introduced by President Mauricio Macri's government.

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The strike is planned to last for 48 hours and teachers from 6 provinces (Buenos Aires, Federal Capital, Corrientes, Chaco, Santa Cruz and Tierra del Fuego) will participate to press on for their demands. 

"There is a national project of deterioration of public education," Eduardo Lopez, Secretary-General of the Workers of Education Union (UTE), said in a press conference, in reference to not only the very small salary increase but also to a lack of supplies and conditions for a proper quality education.

The striking teachers are planning a large mobilization and protest Tuesday at 11:00 am local time in front of the Buenos Aires government building.

The main reason behind the strike seems to be the suspension of the meetings between the education workers and the national government in an attempt to take away bargaining power from the teacher unions in the country by Macri.

"The education in Argentina is regulated by province, so every province would negotiate with their teachers the salary increase and other demands," Lautaro Gianola, anthropologist and intellectual from Bariloche, told teleSUR Monday explaining the now-suspended policy. 

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"During the Kirchner governments, the "paritaria" meetings for teachers were national," said Gianola. During the governments of Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner, and her late husband Nestor Kirchner, the unions could negotiate as one, having a stronger position for their demands with both the local and national governments, explained Lautaro Gianola.

The national government would then place pressure on the provincial government to maintain a decent level of salary increase that corresponds to national inflation levels, he added. 

However "Macri's government established the minimum salary increase at 15 percent for every single job in Argentina and eliminated the national 'paritarias'. But now the inflation rate is around 25 percent up," Gianola warned because such an increase would leave the teachers and other workers in the country well below the amount needed to survive the increasing inflation rates. 

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