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De­spite gov­ern­ment as­sur­ances that salary in­creas­es are im­mi­nent, many teach­ers stayed away from class­rooms for a sec­ond con­sec­u­tive day yes­ter­day in what was de­scribed as a silent protest, leav­ing par­ents un­cer­tain and schools op­er­at­ing un­even­ly.

Scores of ed­u­ca­tors were ab­sent over the non-pay­ment of a promised five per cent salary in­crease, out­stand­ing al­lowances and retroac­tive pay, de­spite ear­li­er com­mit­ments that pay­ments would be made in Jan­u­ary. The ac­tion con­tin­ued even af­ter a Min­istry of Ed­u­ca­tion me­dia re­lease on Mon­day af­ter­noon stat­ed that Cab­i­net had ap­proved the Uni­fied Teach­ers As­so­ci­a­tion (TTUTA) agree­ment with Chief Per­son­nel Of­fi­cer Dr Daryl Din­di­al last April.

By the end of Tues­day, the Min­istry said learn­ing had con­tin­ued in all ed­u­ca­tion dis­tricts and stu­dent at­ten­dance re­mained steady. Ca­roni and St George East record­ed good turnout, while Vic­to­ria and South East­ern showed pos­i­tive lev­els of teacher and stu­dent at­ten­dance. On­ly one per cent of schools record­ed ear­ly dis­missals. The Min­istry ac­knowl­edged that teacher at­ten­dance had fall­en be­low its usu­al 91 per cent but main­tained there was no jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for any with­draw­al of labour.