Benmoussa: Sanctions against suspended teachers are 'temporary exclusions'

In a first-of-its-kind precedent, the Ministry of National Education’s disciplinary councils have taken penalties of “temporary exclusion” from the profession in the case of suspended teachers.

Benmoussa said, during today’s oral question session in the House of Representatives, that the specialized disciplinary councils met last week, where warning sanctions were taken against a number of teachers, and therefore the payment of wages will resume.

“While in limited cases, the decision of temporary exclusion was taken against some teachers, mostly limited to less than a month, and their situation will be settled after the approval of the disciplinary records and notification of the decision taken and serving this period of punishment,” he added: “They will resume their work after the passage of the punitive period.”

The minister continued: “We did not interfere as a ministry in the work of disciplinary councils … and those who disagree with these results have the right to either file grievances with the ministry or resort to the competent judiciary in these cases,” he said, adding that “issuing such decisions is part of the ministry’s concern for fairness, which means balancing between rights and duties by studying each file individually with fairness and without other calculations.”

In response to two questions submitted by the Justice and Development and Progress and Socialism teams, the same government official stated that “taking such decisions is within the framework of applying the requirements of the statute of the public service, as there are regional committees that studied all these files, and a number of them issued decisions of warning, reprimand and reinstatement of wages for a large number of teachers suspended since January.”

A member of the Justice and Development team criticized “holding trade unionists accountable for incitement,” saying that “this is not right, taking into account the nature of trade union work, which is mobilization,” noting that “a number of teachers were held accountable for statements and writings on social media platforms outside the institution, which is a violation of constitutional and legal matters, whether it is related to freedom of expression or the right to trade unionism and the right to strike.”

The parliamentarian criticized the minister’s statement that “the committees are independent and decide,” adding: “On the contrary. “On the contrary, the committees are only advisory and make proposals to you.”