The coordinator of the Union of All Education Professionals (STOP) said this Sunday that he sent a request to the two union centrals to schedule, as soon as possible, preferably at the end of this month, a general strike.
“The CGTP [Confederação Geral dos Trabalhadores Portugueses] We condemn, and rightly so, this attack on the right to strike and we also appeal to the UGT [União Geral de Trabalhadores] schedule a general strike,” André Pestana told the Lusa news agency.
The STOP coordinator recalled that, since the two union centrals are the only ones that can call a general strike, that “do it as soon as possible, preferably this month”and “today an appeal was sent” to both structures.
In your opinion,It can still be scheduled for February, if there is, it will”, since it is up to STOP “to make a constructive appeal for this to happen, because all professional sectors are suffering.”
“The CGTP, which demonstrated for the minimum services, then, that it be consistent and that it then call a general strike, to defend the public school, which is transversal to all professions,” he stressed.
But also, continued André Pestana, “because this general strike should clearly tell the government that it must stop prioritizing billions of euros for bankers and ruinous public-private partnerships.”
Of the three points that came out of the meeting, which took place throughout the day on Saturday in Coimbra, with more than a hundred representatives of union commissions, one is “to affirm that, despite the minimum services, the strike will follow”.
One last point, he added, is that “a call was made to the organizers of the teachers’ demonstration on February 11 to join the demands of non-teachers.”
In the opinion of the STOP coordinator, “the unity between teachers and non-teachers is what made January one of the months with the greatest struggle in the field of education” in Portugal.
“This unity has made power tremble and has made the President of the Republic say, a few days ago, a message for the Government, something like Brussels saying that there is budgetary room to give in on some more difficult things,” he said.
In the same week, Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa also affirmed that “there comes a time when the sympathy that really exists in public opinion towards the cause of teachers can turn against them.”
Questioned by the Lusa news agency about the words of the Head of State, André Pestana was peremptory in saying that “the President of the Republic and politicians also have to realize that the sympathy they have from the population can also change.”
“In other words, education professionals, who work and live from their work, can also find that sympathy for a President of the Republic who is witness to great injustices such as the degradation of public schools and the attack on the right to strike and that, it seems, if you stay neutral, you can also change,” he said.
In this sense, André Pestana mentioned “the Nobel Peace Prize Desmond Tutu [o antigo arcebispo emérito sul-africano e ativista] who said a fantastic phrase: neutrality in the face of injustice is taking the side of the oppressor”.
Source: Observadora
