SCC Warns to Hold More Protests as Pay Raise Committee Submits Report
Head of Public Secondary School Education Teachers Association Hanna Gharib has warned that public sector employees and teachers would hold protests again if lawmakers failed to approve the wage scale draft-law in its initial form.
Gharib accused all parliamentary blocs of standing against the public sector pay hike.
He urged all supporters of the Syndicate Coordination Committee to resort to the streets this week if lawmakers slashed the 121 percent wage hike.
The SCC, a coalition of private and public school teachers and public sector employees, has been holding protests to pressure MPs into approving the raise without slashing the 121 percent raise demanded by the grouping or making the payments in installments.
However, several officials and the Economic Committees, a grouping of businessmen and owners of major companies, have warned that the hike would further burden Lebanon's economy.
The SCC does not accept the approval of the wage scale at the expense of the retirees or those who have limited incomes, Gharib said.
His remarks came as a ministerial-parliamentary committee, which studied the raise, referred its report to parliament's secretary-general on Monday.
The committee was formed after lawmakers failed to approve the wage scale draft-law over differences on ways to fund it.
An Nahar daily quoted informed sources as saying that Speaker Nabih Berri could call for a parliamentary session on Thursday or Friday to discuss the amended draft-law.
Committee member MP Jamal al-Jarrah said that the amended draft-law had figures lower than initially approved by former Premier Najib Miqati's government in 2012 before its referral to parliament.
But he stressed in remarks to An Nahar that the payment would be made starting July 1 and without installments.
G.K.
D.A.
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