Balqa university agrees to demands of striking administrative staff

AMMAN — Administrative staff members at Balqa Applied University (BAU) began a strike on Sunday over labour demands, which the university administration agreed to meet later in the day.

An employee at the university’s main campus in Salt, some 35km northwest of Amman, who preferred to remain unnamed, said the strike was a result of the administration’s “disregard” for demands that a committee of workers submitted to it four months ago.

The demands include improving medical insurance services, especially because subscribers’ parents were recently excluded from the coverage.  

“The medical insurance is completely useless. Hospitals and pharmacies give us a hard time because the university does not pay its dues although it deducts insurance fees from our salaries,” she told The Jordan Times over the phone.

The BAU employee said the list of demands also requires that the university commit to giving staff members a percentage of parallel programme fees, which are supposed to reach up to JD50 monthly. 

“Workers only get JD12 every month while instructors get their percentage in full,” she claimed, citing other demands such as creating a housing fund and calculating end-of-service compensation from the date of the contract, not the date of classifying employees, which happens three years after the contract is signed.

“We demand the rotation of directors and equal application of the university’s regulations,” she said, claiming that workers do not have equal opportunities to improve their skills and educational levels.

She charged that BAU President Nabeel Shawaqfeh was “forced to leave his office” on Sunday, and that the university announced suspension of classes, with “up to 1,500 workers” at its branches across the Kingdom participating in the strike.

Mohammad Barakat, assistant professor at the university’s faculty of engineering technology, said instructors did not participate in the strike, especially since students are discussing their graduation projects and taking exams at present.

“Most of the employees at the engineering faculty are working at their offices,” he told The Jordan Times, adding that the number of employees participating in the strike is “limited”.

Barakat said the strike is not having a big effect on the education process, as instructors use an electronic system to register grades.  

Later on Sunday, BAU Spokesperson Ahmad Manaseer said Shawaqfeh met with the administrative employees on strike and issued a decision that addressed their demands.

He added that the university raised the ceiling of workers’ medical insurance in all three levels, without increasing subscriptions.

Insurance paperwork for all campuses across the Kingdom is processed at the main campus in Salt, Manaseer said, which “takes time”.

He added that allocations from parallel programme fees for employees were increased from JD10-15 to JD25-30, and the percentages will be re-examined at the beginning of the next academic year.

The university has consulted the Legislation and Opinion Bureau on the end-of-service compensation and approved calculating it from the date of appointment, Manaseer added.

“There are no more reasons for workers to go on with their strike,” he concluded.