Kelaniya dons meet to decide on strike

July 9, 2012, 9:53 pm , the island

by Dasun Edirisinghe

 Lecturers of the Kelaniya University have been invited to a special committee meeting of their union tomorrow to decide whether to join the ongoing all out strike launched by the Federation of University Teachers’ Associations (FUTA).

FUTA President Dr. Nirmal Ranjith Devasiri told The Island that teachers of medical faculties, Kelaniya and Uva Wellassa Universities had yet to join the ongoing trade union action.

FUTA launched an indefinite strike on June 04 demanding the allocation of six per cent of GDP to the education sector, engagement of university teachers in the decision making process related to the higher education sector and a pay hike.

Dr. Devasiri said, 60 teachers of the Kelaniya University had asked their university union’s parent body to join the strike and they had called a special committee meeting for that purpose.

He said that there were no trade unions in the newly formed Uva Wellassa University and teachers there, too, were in the process of forming a trade union.Although medical faculty teachers did not participate in the strike, they had endorsed the FUTA demands, Dr. Devasiri said.

Dr. N. D. N. A. Mendis of the Faculty of Medicine Teachers’ Union, of the Colombo University, told The Island that his association, too, would join the strike if the government did not meed the FUTA demands.

Dr. Devasiri said that FUTA would participate in the second round of the discussion with Presidential Secretary Lalith Weeratunga on Thursday.