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Teachers
demand payment for services offered during poll
ZimOnline
November 04, 2006
http://www.zimonline.co.za/Article.aspx?ArticleId=408
MASVINGO – Thousands
of teachers who were engaged as polling officers in last weekend’s
rural council elections yesterday demanded that the government pays
them their outstanding allowances or face legal action.
The cash-strapped
government of President Robert Mugabe had promised to pay the teachers
a day after the elections which were held last Saturday.
But almost a
week after the controversial elections won by the ruling ZANU PF
party, the teachers are still to receive their money.
A petition signed
by about 5 000 teachers which was sent to the Zimbabwe Electoral
Commission (ZEC) which ran the elections, accused the government
of making empty promises over their payment.
"We are
demanding our outstanding payments within seven days, failure (of)
which we will engage our lawyers to recover the owed money with
interest.
"This is
not the first time that we have failed to get our payments on time
after conducting polls.
"Last year,
some of our members were not paid their monies and later gave up
after a series of follow-up meetings which did not bear any fruit,"
read part of the petition.
Nobert Magobe,
a teacher in Masvingo, said out of the Z$30 000 they had been promised
for conducting the elections, they had only received $6 000 which
ZEC said was for their upkeep during polling.
"Since
Monday, we have been checking at our banks and no payments have
been made so far. Next time, I will not participate in any elections,"
said Magobe.
Contacted for
comment yesterday, ZEC spokesman Utoile Silaigwana said he was not
aware of the petition adding that payments for the polling officers
were being worked out.
"We are
still processing payments for some civil servants who were not paid,"
said the spokesman. - ZimOnline
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