Saudi female teachers ask for pay parity

Dubai: About 100,000 female teachers in government schools in Saudi Arabia may file a case against the Ministry of Education for paying 35 per cent less salaries than their male counterparts.

Adnan Al Amri, the lawyer to represent the committee formed 18 months ago to fight the case at legal level, told Gulf News yesterday that the legal team formed to handle the case is waiting for the outcome of the conciliatory effort with the ministry.

"We will go to court in four weeks time, if the issue is not resolved amicably. I have a great hope in the sincerity of the government to adhere to the complaint of teachers who have been suffering salary inequality for more than 15 years till now.

Al Amri agreed that the issue was brought to light because female teachers have individually exhausted all ways to settle the issue and decided to go as a group to the court.

He said the problem started in 1997 when the General Directorate of Female Education (GDFE) adopted a recruiting scheme according to which women were paid a SR4,000 (Dh 3,917) flat monthly salary. "The salary paid for male teachers employed by the Ministry of Education was well above SR7,000, with additional allowances that varies from case to case," Al Amri explained.

Merger

"The GDFE was merged with the Ministry of Education two years ago as part of the reform plan set up by the government and both male and female teachers are working under the same umbrella but their salaries are not on par for no justifiable reason," he said.

Ghaida'a Ahmad, Head of the Committee representing the teachers, said the committee has been working with the ministry since mid-2008 without any result.

"We were not happy with the ministry's reaction to our just demands. Dr Noura Al Fayez, the only female undersecretary in the kingdom who handles the issues concerning female education in Saudi Arabia, told us to abide by the rules if we wanted to hold on to our jobs or leave our posts for fresh Saudi women graduates waiting for employment in government schools," Ghaida'a said.

"Naturally, our demand to the government is to pay back income losses to all teachers in retrospectively. I, for instance, lost more than SR600,000 for unjustified salary imbalance. Others could have lost an amount of up to SR1 million."

Ghaida'a said she called officials in the government including the Grand Mufti.

Disparity