Governor apologizes after accusing teachers of ‘doing nothing’
Cagayan Governor Manuel Mamba was forced to issue an apology following his accusation that teachers are doing less work with the government’s blended learning scheme.
Mamba told radio station DZRH Saturday that “teachers are simply enjoying themselves at home and receiving salaries without working.”
Mamba added that he thinks that the government is being shortchanged and hinted that teachers’ salaries may be slashed soon.
Alliance of Concerned Teachers (ACT) president Joselyn Fegalan said Mamba had no right to accuse teachers of doing less work as teachers are in fact burdened by greater workload due to the Department of Education’s blended learning scheme.
“Teachers deserve an apology. You go back to that radio station and say sorry,” Fegalan said.
Mamba is ignorant of the situation of teachers even in his home province, ACT secretary general Raymond Basilio added.
“It seems he does not know that many teachers spend their already inadequate salaries to buy paper, laptops, printers and ink because the government has yet to fully provide these,” he said.
“Gov, it’s World Teachers Day on Monday (today, October 5) and this is your message to them? Is this how you thank them?” Basilio asked.
The Student Council of the University of the Philippines College of Education also condemned Mamba’s remarks as “patently insensitive, infuriating and disrespectful of the teachers’ effort to educate amid the pandemic.”
‘Just being fatherly’
Mamba in a statement Sunday he is sorry and did not mean to hurt any teacher, adding he wanted to challenge everyone with his remarks.
In another DZRH interview Sunday, Mamba said he has high regard for teachers as shown by his administration’s involvement of teachers in provincial government projects.
Mamba added he was just being fatherly in lecturing just as he was in admitting mistakes.
A source from Mamba’s camp told Kodao that the interviewer did not give the governor a chance to fully explain what he meant as the interview was at its end. # (Raymund B. Villanueva)
