Teachers continue voting despite delays

Teachers continue voting despite delays

Thousands of teachers yesterday continued voting on whether they will embark on a national strike.
Several challenges have been experienced, but the Namibia National Teachers’ Union (Nantu) leadership promised that these problems would be ironed out.
Before the voting started on Tuesday regional governors were still to address teachers in a last-ditch attempt to convince them not to vote in favour of striking. But in many regions teachers shunned these meetings and officials were met by empty chairs.
In the Khomas Region the voting started on Tuesday and was to end by 18:00 yesterday, after which counting would start.
Voting started in Erongo, Kunene, Kavango West and Hardap yesterday.
Nantu secretary-general Basilius Haingura told Namibian Sun that the voting was delayed on Tuesday because the ballot papers were only approved on Monday and could not be dispatched on time to the voting stations at all circuit offices and directorates of education countrywide. The process was expected to start at 13:00, but only got under way at about 16:00.
Haingura said they were not expecting any delays yesterday.
He said another problem was that teachers were still queuing after 18:00 when the voting stations closed and they had to ascertain whether voting was allowed to continue after 18:00.
Another challenge was the vast distances union officials had to cover in two weeks’ time and that they only had two days for voting per region. He said this meant that mobile voting stations could only spend two hours at a place before moving on.
The last day of voting will be on 15 September from 13:00 to 18:00.
Haingura said preliminary results would not be released. The final results for the regions will be announced on 16 September and the national results will be announced on 19 September.
Teachers are voting for or against a strike after Nantu failed to convince the government to increase their salaries by 8%. The government offered 5%, citing economic difficulties and budget constraints.

ELLANIE SMIT