Teachers to join trucker strike in Paraguay starting Tuesday

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The Federation of Educators of Paraguay (FEP), Silvio Piris, said teachers would mobilize from Tuesday, August 10, with other unions to demand a basic salary, while truck drivers have been on strike for a week.

The teachers’ union assures that they will carry out caravans and talks of roadblocks if necessary due to the non-fulfillment of the basic professional salary. The mobilization aims to put pressure on the meeting with legislators and other authorities on the issue.

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Silvio Piris explained that “the demand we are making is already 20 years old. Moreover, it is about next year’s budget. We ask that our project be dealt with in the session. We are constantly lobbying, but we have had bad experiences in this regard because we were ignored at the time.”

For this week, several sectors are announcing mobilizations to demand different issues. In addition to the truck drivers still on strike, farmers and indigenous people from 14 departments arrived in Asunción on Monday to begin a mobilization demanding that the government comply with the current aid laws.

According to their demands, the Ministry of Agriculture (MAG) has had US$25 million available for more than eight months to support the reactivation of production in family farming in the context of the pandemic.

So far, the agreement signed under Law 6669/2020 has not been implemented. The urgently needed assistance should have been provided within three months, but nothing has happened for eight months.

The only mobilization that has taken place so far is that of the truck drivers.

In this context, the leaders of the main industrial, production, and trade union federations have affirmed that they have always been ready for dialogue. Still, in the case of the truck strike, they will not do so unless they respect freedom of movement and close roads.

For his part, the union’s spokesperson, Ángel Zaracho, said that the truck drivers could not continue to work under the current conditions, as fuel prices have risen three times and freight prices have fallen three times. Therefore, they will not give up their demand until they get the attention of the executive and the MPs.