Teachers urged to report for duty, vaccinated or not
THE PRESIDENT of the St Vincent and the Grenadines Teachers Union (SGTU), Oswald Robinson, is urging teachers to report for work despite their vaccination status and not to submit their lesson plans to the Ministry of Education.
“Our lesson plans are your intellectual property, and you have rights to your property,” Robinson said, adding “they can’t have your lesson plans without you”.
In a voice-recording circulated on social media, Robinson said that the authorities are planning to take the lessons developed by the teachers “and give it to other people, which means they want to reinvent slavery.
“In fact, your online teaching is not counted as you being at work,” Robinson said, indicating that the union would be challenging “these things”.
“If you have schema work for them, and you want to carry it in, you carry it in or send it in. But we have said that everybody must show up for work,” he said.
“Don’t be afraid; don’t get into any battle with anybody. Nobody can physically manhandle and put you off the compound. If the police come and want to escort you off, take a picture of – document everything that is said to you or what happens for your records and for our records.”
The government has issued a mandatory vaccination policy for a wide cross-section of state employees who must prove they are vaccinated, if they are to remain on their jobs. The policy came into effect on Friday.
Unvaccinated workers who turn up to their jobs will be considered as being absent, and if they miss work for 10 consecutive days, they would be considered as having abandoned their jobs.
But Robinson urged teachers not to have any conflicts with principals, adding that some principals are also members of the union.
“I know they are trying to use the principals as the massa on the plantation. But our principals are not stupid. They have a conscience and they know their teachers have been walking with them. So they can’t change your heart overnight to get them to suppress you and trample on you,” said Robinson, a retired principal.
He said that principals, in keeping with the instruction of the Ministry of Education, may ask teachers for their COVID-19 vaccination cards.
“But all you have to say, well, that’s not part of my requirement based on when you get your appointment to go on the job,” Robinson said.
“So you have not signed any contract with anybody to say you have to produce that and if they want you to be vaccinated, ask them for the contract, that in the event you take any vaccines, what are the liability on their part? So my brothers and sisters, stay calm, stay cool, remain focused, and we are going to fight this to the end,” he said.
Robinson said that the union is in conversation with its legal advisor and will be issuing a joint press statement with “some of our allies”.
“We are going to win this battle, and and we will give glory to the Creator; this matter is ours in the hand of the Almighty. And he would break down every barrier, every obstacle, that is in our way.”