Coalition pays Yemen teachers’ salaries

After a two-month delay to the start of the Yemeni school year, teachers are now receiving funds from the Arab Coalition.

Minister of State Dr Anwar Gargash said yesterday that the UN would be responsible for distributing the cash to remedy the dire financial situation.

He said the UN would hand out the $75 million (Dh275.4m) provided by the coalition to pay salaries for 135,000 teachers in liberated and Houthi-occupied areas.

“Removal of letter of credit requirements by Yemeni Central Bank will facilitate more food imports,” Dr Gargash said on Twitter.

Millions of pupils were kept out of schools this year after staff went on strike in September.

The teachers demanded a 30 per cent increase in wages and more commitment from the government in Aden to battle diseases in schools.

The government’s failure to respond led to more strikes, prompting the coalition to provide financial aid.

Dr Abdullah Lamlas, the Minister of Education, said last month that the war had destroyed the education system in Yemen and stopped millions of children from going to school.

Dr Lamlas said 3,600 schools were shut because of the conflict and that 67 per cent of teachers were not being paid.

Unicef earlier estimated that about 4.5 million children in Yemen risked losing access to state schools because teachers had not been paid in nearly two years.

The payment will help to continue the education of millions of pupils across the liberated areas of Yemen.

The coalition, with several non-profit organisations, has helped to set up temporary schooling solutions in the absence of government-provided education in the country.

A recent offensive by coalition forces liberated several areas along Yemen’s west coast, allowing pupils to return to school for the first time since 2015, when most facilities were closed under Houthi control.