The Federation of University Teachers’ Associations says it will step up trade union action, citing a failure to resolve the problems facing Sri Lanka’s state university system, Hiru News reported.
FUTA Media Spokesperson Senior Lecturer Charudatta Ilangasinghe said the issues had been under discussion for the past two years without adequate measures being taken.
The complaint
Ilangasinghe said the quality of public education was declining significantly because highly qualified academic staff were leaving and no new recruitments were being made.
He said discussions had been held with the Prime Minister and the Minister of Education in an attempt to resolve the issues, but that those talks had not produced satisfactory results.
He further said that letters had been sent to the President and the Deputy Minister of Finance around two weeks ago, seeking discussions on three matters:
- university funding allocations
- infrastructure facilities
- matters affecting students
No response had been received and no solutions had been forthcoming, he said. It is on that basis — continued lack of progress — that the federation is preparing to intensify its action.
A dispute running since at least September
This is the latest stage of a dispute that has already produced two rounds of action this academic year. FUTA members held a protest on 2 September and then struck for a day on 9 September.
What distinguishes the current warning from those earlier stages is the escalation path: the federation now says it has gone above the Education Ministry to the President and the Treasury, and that the approach was not answered.
The complaint over academic staff departures also sits against a wider backdrop in higher education — the Deputy Minister of Education said this week that special committees had been appointed to formulate policies for engineering, medical and agricultural education.
Not reported
Hiru’s filing does not say what form the intensified action will take, when it will begin, or whether a strike date has been set. It does not report how many of FUTA’s constituent associations have endorsed the decision, nor whether any ballot was held. It carries no response from the President’s office, the Treasury, the Ministry of Education or the University Grants Commission, and does not give the dates of the letters or the earlier meetings.
Ada Derana also reported the statement, but the site has been unreachable from this newsroom for three weeks and could not be fetched or cited.
