New Delhi: Pakistan’s education system is in a crisis. Teachers and professors across provinces are now protesting against the government’s increased privatisation of the system, denouncing the move as a ‘brutal killing’ of public education.
Protests have erupted across Punjab with different teachers’ unions protesting against the privatisation of public education with a new initiative under the Maryam Nawaz government. Called the ‘Schools of Eminence’, the initiative has seen protests from different sections of teachers who claim it effectively ends access to education for the middle class and does away with pensions.
Separately, in the Sindh province, the Karachi University teachers’ union are demanding a solution to the months-long unpaid wages and has refused to conduct semester exams.
‘Purchasing power has eroded’
It began after the Punjab government under Maryam Nawaz launched a new initiative aimed at transforming some of the province’s largest public schools through partnerships with private operators. Teachers’ groups then condemned it as a sweeping privatisation of public education.
Under the plan called Nawaz Sharif Schools of Eminence, large public schools in major cities, district headquarters and tehsil centres will be transferred to non-governmental organisations and private education providers under a public-private partnership model.
The latest flashpoint is the University of Karachi. Faculty members at the University have now, for a week, led a sustained boycott of semester examinations, rejecting a government-backed proposal aimed at ending a dispute over unpaid salaries and benefits.
The strike began on 5 May after faculty members complained of delays in compensation for evening classes, examination supervision, paper marking, question-paper preparation, leave encashment and other benefits. Non-teaching staff later joined the protest, broadening the dispute and increasing pressure on the university administration, Express Tribune reported.
Professors say it is a governance failure as wages have largely failed to keep pace with rising costs, and salaried professionals, including teachers, office workers, clerks and other middle-income earners, have seen their purchasing power erode and their savings depleted.
“Over the past five to six years, particularly since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, Pakistan’s middle class has faced a sustained economic squeeze. Inflation has surged, taxes have risen sharply, and economic growth has remained weak. Salaried professionals, including teachers, office workers, clerks and other middle-income earners, have seen their purchasing power erode and their savings depleted,” Taimur Rahman, a professor of political science at LUMS, Pakistan, told ThePrint.
He added that wages have largely failed to keep pace with rising costs. The government has increased direct taxes on salaries while also relying heavily on indirect levies on essentials such as fuel and electricity.
“The combined effect has been devastating for middle-class households. Many who once enjoyed a measure of financial stability now find themselves struggling to maintain their standard of living. In practical terms, much of Pakistan’s middle class has been hollowed out over the last several years,” Rahman said.
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Crumbling education system
The first phase of the Schools of Eminence programme in Punjab would cover 155 schools, each occupying more than an acre of land and containing at least 20 classrooms. At least 800 to 1,000 students have already enrolled. The initiative is being administered through the Punjab Education Foundation, according to a report by Pakistan Today.
Teachers’ unions and pensioners’ organisations in Punjab Tuesday intensified their opposition to the government’s expanding use of public-private partnerships in education, arguing that the policy is eroding job security, depressing wages and weakening the province’s public school system.
At a news conference on Wednesday, leaders of the Punjab Teachers Union, the Educators Association and the Education Pensioners Association denounced the outsourcing of government schools and colleges, as well as the province’s newly launched Schools of Eminence programme. They described the reforms as a fundamental threat to public education and called for their immediate reversal.
Union leaders said that roughly 15,000 government schools had been transferred to private management in the past year, a move they claimed resulted in the elimination of nearly 50,000 teaching positions.
According to the organisations, many permanent teaching jobs have been replaced by contract positions filled by graduates and MPhil degree holders employed by private operators at salaries ranging from PKR 8,000 to PKR 10,000 a month.
The Schools of Eminence initiative offers higher starting salaries between PKR 50,000 and PKR 60,000 per month, according to government announcements. But union leaders argued that these positions lack pensions, gratuity benefits, and the long-term employment protections traditionally associated with public-sector teaching jobs, Express Tribune reported.
“In effect, the doors to permanent employment are being closed to the younger generation,” the representatives of the union were quoted as saying.
(Edited by Saptak Datta)