Disgruntled parents

President Porfirio Lobo
President Manuel ZelayaTEGUCIGALPA, Honduras - The Honduran government wants to impose a law aimed at ensuring the country's frequently striking teachers show up for work the number of days legally required. Teachers responded by walking off the job. Disgruntled parents - who would get greater oversight over schools under the proposed law - complain their children spend more days at home than in school. The three-week old teachers' strike has become a catalyst for a wider political movement against the government, and to demand the return from exile of ousted former President Manuel Zelaya. At least one teacher has been killed and more than 50 people have been injured in clashes with police, in some of the worst unrest since the months following the June 2009 coup that toppled Zelaya. "The protest will continue and the regime will not break us with repression because people who don't fight never triumph," said Jaime Rodriguez, director of the Federation of Teachers' Organization, which has 70,000 members. The teachers are also demanding six months of unpaid salaries for 6,000 teachers. The Education Ministry insists that salary payments are up to date and the protests are more about destabilizing the government of President Porfirio Lobo. Teachers' strikes are a way of life in Honduras dating back to the 19th century and they gained momentum in the 1960s when teachers won a salary raise from five to seven dollars a month. Most teachers now earn between $600 and $800 a month, just enough to cover basic family expenses, according to government figures. Over the past 10 years, schools have held classes an average of 125 days a year, far below the 200 mandated by the government, according to a recent study by the Inter-American Development Bank, which that blamed constant strikes over salary payment delays and demands for wage hikes. "Teachers are always looking for excuses to be on the streets and abandon the classrooms," said Maria Saravia, president of the National Parents' Association. "They don't teach. They always demand more and more salaries." Lobo has declared the current strike illegal and is pressing on with efforts to push through the "Law of Community Participation for the Improvement of Education," which would give parents, town mayors and local civil organizations more oversight to ensure that teachers show up to class. It is set to be discussed Saturday in town halls in all 298 of the country's municipalities. "The idea is that the teachers be in the classroom the required amount of time and that their work be evaluated by citizens and the local authorities where they work," said Juan Hernandez, the president of Congress. Teachers see it as an attempt to muzzle their right to protest. "They are trying to control us and pit us against the community," said Edwin Olivia, a teachers' union leader. "We will not allow it." - FREDDY CUEVAS