RIGA — Hundreds of teachers met outside the Cabinet of Ministers building earlier today to protest against planned government reforms to the education sector and harsh salary cuts affecting public sector workers.
The demonstration followed yesterday’s protest by hundreds of Bauska residents angered at moves to scale back services at the city’s sole hospital.
Today’s demonstration, which passed peacefully despite calls from the crowd for more aggressive action, coincided with the first day of the Latvian school year.
Black-clad protesters released hundreds of black balloons with the message “save the education system.”
Latvian Education and Science Workers Association deputy Janis Krastins said the symbolic gestures reflected teachers’ lack of faith in the government and hopes for intervention from a higher power.
Krastins said the aim of the protest was not to disrupt the first day of school, but to draw public attention to the wider ramifications of planned reforms to the sector, which many see as an attack on education quality in Latvia.
Other public sector employees join
Protesters were supported by high profile civic and political representatives, as well as staff from Riga’s First Hospital, where some 570 medical and non-medical staff were sacked last month following a severe cutback in services at the facility.
Education Minister Tatyana Koke was not in attendance.
Teachers’ salaries were trimmed 15 percent in January, before being slashed a further 20 percent in June as part of deep cuts by Latvia’s center-right government in order to meet requirements for a €7.5 billion bailout package agreed with the International Monetary Fund and other lenders.
In April some 10,000 teachers angered by the move marched through Riga streets demanding a fairer deal.
Outside Riga
The latest protest came as police were forced to answer to criticism over their handling of yesterday’s demonstration in Bauska.
Anti-riot police from Riga were called to disperse crowds blocking major roadways leading in and out of the city in protest against the planned reorganization of Bauska Hospital into an outpatient clinic.
In a heated confrontation protesters holding placards demanded to meet Minister for Health Baiba Rozentāle and attempted to push past a police barricade.
Police Commissioner Valdis Voins, who appeared last night on Latvian news program “100 Pants” defended police actions against claims that they were aggressive and heavy-handed.
Voins also declined to comment directly on rumors that officers from Riga’s Special Forces unit were dispatched to the unauthorized protest only after local city police officers refused to intervene.
However, he revealed plans are underway to establish small, specialized units within the regions in anticipation of further civil unrest.
Healthcare and education system cuts and reforms are part of government efforts to trim 500 million lati (€711.44 million) from its budget expenditures.
Latvia’s teachers, farmers, medical workers and others have each held several peaceful protests throughout 2009 against the conservative government’s budget cuts. The only violent reaction to the country’s ongoing economic woes came in January, when hundreds of youths clashed with police in the capital city following a peaceful anti-government rally.
