2014-12-18
A teacher gives a lesson at a primary school in Henan province, Nov. 14, 2013.
IMAGINECHINA
Hundreds of laid-off teachers converged on government buildings in the eastern Chinese province of Jiangsu on Thursday in protest at the government’s refusal to honor promises to give them civil servant status.
Carrying red banners bearing a single character, “Injustice,” and a banner which read simply “We need to eat,” the teachers marched to the headquarters of the Jiangsu provincial government to demand better pensions and health insurance.
An unknown number were detained amid scuffles with police and the more than 1,000 laid-off and retired teachers from several counties and cities in the province.
A protester from Jiangsu’s Xuzhou city surnamed Li said: “We have come here to the provincial government, but none of the leaders will come out to meet us.”
He said officials from the provincial education bureau and complaints office had said it would be “difficult” to meet protesters’ demands.
Teachers in China can be hired on civil service or non-civil service contracts, and those employed on the latter frequently complain of wages that are below a minimum living standard and that often go unpaid for months.
They also frequently complain of a lack of pensions and other benefits after retirement, or when they are laid off.
‘Unreasonable’
Directive No. 32, issued by the central authorities in 1997, called on local governments to put all teachers on civil service contracts, which carry higher wages and more benefits, including a retirement pension.
But cash-strapped local authorities have dragged their feet over the new rules.
“Some of the teachers who came from Xuzhou today were taken away by police. They were held in the provincial government offices by a group of police officers,” Li said.
“There was also a 76-year-old protester from Yangzhou who was shoved to the ground and had to be taken to Nanjing Emergency Medical Center,” he added.
According to Li, many of Jiangsu’s teachers only got into teaching because of a recruitment drive by Beijing, and have now been left with no income years later.
