Venezuelan university professors to strike June 10 over unfulfilled demands

Public university professors in Venezuela will join a nationwide education strike on June 10, formally announced by the Association of Professors of the Central University of Venezuela (Apucv). This action unites demands from various levels of public education under an initial call from the Venezuelan Federation of Teachers.

The announcement occurred during a protest outside the Ministry of University Education in Caracas, marking the second such demonstration by faculty in the past month. Apucv President José Gregorio Afonso criticized the national government for its continued silence and lack of institutional responses to the sector's grievances. Professors had previously met with ministry officials on May 12.

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The professors and university staff will maintain the agenda of conflict in a sustained manner until they are heard by the Executive, clarifying that all actions will be executed without transgressing the constitutional framework.

The Apucv leadership strongly condemned the government's failure to uphold formal commitments regarding income and salary adjustments. They highlighted that this issue affects not only the education sector but also public administration and workers nationwide. Specifically, they denounced the discriminatory and discretionary allocation of a "professional responsibility" bonus, announced on April 30.

Internal data from Apucv indicates that 96% of actively contracted university professors did not receive this bonus. The exclusion also impacted 54% of tenured professors and 95% of retirees, whom the union described as the most severely affected by the government's salary policy omissions. Afonso stated that the strike is not the professors' responsibility but a consequence of the government's actions, asserting that educators have been working for decades under inadequate conditions. He vowed that the faculty would sustain their protest actions within constitutional limits until the executive branch addresses their demands.

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On June 10, an absolute strike of public education in universities, and it is not our responsibility. Educators and professors in this country have been working for decades for free, paying to work, so no one can hold us responsible for the education stopping. It stops because of the government.