GHALANAI: Teachers of community model schools in Mohmand tribal district have threatened to close all the 28 educational centres working under the Fata Education Foundation (FEF) if their salaries were not paid in the current month.

The teachers, including Mohammad Zahid, Ikram Khan, Wisal Ahmad, Nawab Khan and others from Pandiali and Prang Ghar tehsils, aired their worries while speaking at a news conference at the Mohmand Press Club here on Wednesday.

They said two NGOs, HRDN (Human Resource Development Network) and HIN (Help in Need), had established 28 community schools in the far-flung areas of the two tehsils in 2012. They said in July 2016 these schools were handed over to the FEF.

On the occasion, Mohammad Zahid said they were not only under-paid but had also not been given their salary for last 10 months while some of the teachers were not paid for 16 months.

He said there were 28 community schools with 56 teachers and at least 4,000 students were enrolled. He said they had lodged their protest and met with the officials at the Governor House and the higher education department for resolution of the issue, but to no avail.

Mr Zahid said FEF had issued issue show-cause notices to five teachers for raising the salary issue.

The teachers said they had also met with the education officials in the merged areas secretariat, who said that they had given Rs3.65 million to FEF for payment of salaries.

The community schoolteachers complained that the FEF chief did not listen to them when they met him. They said all the teachers had been given their service books but were not regularised.

“Instead of giving credit to us for running these schools in backward areas, we have been deprived of our salaries,” Wisal Ahmad, another teacher, lamented. He said most of the teachers had not been paid for 16 months.

“We are running co-education schools in conflict-hit areas where government is unable to run schools,” he maintained.

The teachers warned that if the government did not order payment of salaries by Jan 10, they would close the schools in protest.

Published in Dawn, January 3rd, 2019