‘Secret files’ kept on teachers

TEACHERS’ union OELMEK yesterday accused the Education Ministry of having “files and shadow-files” to keep tabs on teachers.

Union head Georgos Kallias called on the ministry to destroy the “shadow files” that had been created against certain teachers, ignoring legal procedures.

Explaining further, Kallias said that unbeknown to them, accusations were being made against teachers by parents and pupils, and were being lodged by the ministry in the “shadow files”.

The OELMEK head also announced that teachers had received threatening calls from the ministry when they were going to stage a protest.

“Yesterday, certain officials of the Education Ministry telephoned a specific branch of teachers and threatened them not to take part in a protest, bringing their end-of-year evaluation as a measure to prevent them from taking part,” said Kallias.

The Education Ministry’s permanent secretary, Olympia Stylianou, said the ministry dealt with possible disciplinary issues by following the relevant law.

She added that the ministry has an obligation to investigate accusations made against teachers and called on OELMEK to discuss their problems with the ministry.

Asked about OELMEK’s accusations that the ministry had threatened teachers, Stylianou said: “I don’t know what they mean exactly; I am not aware and I don’t think such a thing happened.”

OELMEK also raised the issue of teenage delinquency yesterday, with teachers vowing they would no longer put up with violent attacks from “problematic pupils”. Stylianou said the ministry has been evaluating the actions of pupils and teachers over the past school year and following the final exam results, it would be decide on what further actions to take.

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