ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Classes have resumed in the vast majority of schools in Sulaimani and Halabja provinces though protests have continued in the Garmiyan block. "Starting from today, at our school we are resuming work, definitely," the head master of Tawar Basic School in Sulaimani told Rudaw. "The bulk of our teachers and students have returned to the schools," she said, adding that they will hold classes on Saturdays in an effort to make up class hours lost during the strike. Health and education workers in the Kurdistan Region received their salaries on Thursday – with less deducted under the revised salary-saving system. A teacher in Sulaimani urged the few schools that have not yet reopened to return to the classroom. "Those who do not resume work will cost themselves first, and then students," he warned. "The small improvement of the salaries emboldened education employees to return to work," he added. The KRG Council of Ministers passed a new austerity system on March 28 that would cap salary deductions at 30 percent for high earners and 10 percent for low earners. Anyone receiving under $336 will receive their full payment. Public servants have said they will now feel more economically secure as they receive a larger percentage of their salary. Not everyone is happy, however. In some areas of the Garmiyan bloc, in southern Sulaimani province, teachers took to the streets, demanding full cancellation of the salary saving system, Rudaw's Halo Mohammed reported from Kalar. Roughly half the schools in Garmiyan have resumed and while teachers from the other schools continued their strike. The decision of the government to ease the unpopular austerity measure followed on the heels of payment from Baghdad and protests by health and education employees across the Kurdistan Region. Public sector employees have demanded the government pay their salaries on time – every 30 days – after months of delays and reductions in their wages. The KRG introduced the unpopular salary saving system in 2016 following a crippling financial crisis due to the war with ISIS, Iraqi government cutting its share of the budget, and a decrease in oil prices.
