BTU meets Khama
Tsaone Basimanebotlhe | Wednesday June 10, 2015 15:53
The purpose of the meeting was to talk about issues of overtime, levels of operation amongst others, BTU president Johannes Tshukudu said.
“I confirm that we had a meeting with the president. We had requested to meet him last of last week and we were scheduled on Monday,” Tshukudu said.
“Remember BTU has pending issues like levels of operation, which is not the same case with secondary teachers.
“We felt that the president should hear the side of our story as BTU and our suggestions on these issues.”
He said they also talked about the issue of overtime, which is still hanging. Tshukudu said they believed that the issue of overtime could be resolved if the Ministry of Education and Skills Development (MoESD) negotiated with teaching unions in good faith.
“We are going to meet him again after two weeks because he had promised us that he would meet with the Ministry of Education about burning issues in Education and call us back.
He told us that he wanted pending issues of education and unions to be resolved and he would have a meeting with both of us. We hope that these meetings will yield fruits,” he said.
However, Tshukudu said they met the president as BTU and not on behalf of Botswana Federation of Public Service Unions (BOFEPUSU).
“BOFEPUSU does not prevent any of its affiliates from meeting the president. But we cannot negotiate issues of BOFEPUSU with the president without their knowledge or approval. We are members of BOFEPUSU in good standing,” he said, adding that their meeting with the president was not held in secret.
Permanent secretary to the president Carter Morupisi confirmed the meeting between the BTU executive and Khama. “They paid him a courtesy call yesterday. Their meeting was internal and I cannot discuss or say what they met him for,” Morupisi said.