Contractors' Teachers Movement: The Government Disrupts the Upcoming Academic Year

The Contractors' Teachers Movement expressed astonishment in a statement today, Friday, regarding "the government's and the Ministry of Finance's indifference to the demands of contracted and permanent teachers for a productivity allowance for the summer months costing 5 trillion Lebanese pounds." The movement's coordinator, Hamza Mansour, confirmed that the Ministry of Finance "has provided 3.5 trillion out of the 5 trillion costs for the productivity allowance." He addressed the government, stating that "contracted teachers have no monthly income throughout the summer months, which creates serious ramifications preventing them from a decent living, and if they do not receive their entitlement to the productivity allowance, they will resort to announcing an indefinite general strike for the upcoming academic year, a decision agreed upon by all contracted teachers in public, assisted, and wage-based education." He proposed to the Ministry of Education "a mechanism to pay the productivity allowance for the summer months to contracted teachers, which is the same mechanism the Ministry of Education used to pay the productivity allowance for teaching months, based on the monthly contract hours for each contracted teacher, meaning according to their hours each month in relation to the specified number of hours for each month that the contractor must fulfill to receive a full productivity allowance of 300 dollars monthly."