Unions of primary and secondary school teachers on Wednesday rallied outside the government and parliament offices, singing humorous folk songs to tell the government that they have had enough of empty talk and want the problem of the job complexity index of teachers to be resolved.

“You will not solve the problem by ignoring us, we will come here and be on strike as long as it takes for you to deal with the problem of our wages and our job complexity index that are lagging behind those in other sectors,” NSZSSH union leader Branimir Mihalinec said in a message to the government.

The protest outside the government offices was held in parallel with the ongoing rotating strike of teachers which on Monday entered its third week.

On strike today were schools in Varazdin, Istria, Koprivnica-Krizevci, and Krapina-Zagorje counties, and Mihalinec said that teachers in Osijek-Baranja, Bjelovar-Bilogora and Lika-Senj counties would be on strike on Thursday.

Mihalinec said that almost 90 percent of high school teachers were on strike and that he believed the situation was the same in primary schools.

“These people here have come to relay the message of their 68,000 fellow primary and secondary school teachers – stop deluding the people, by announcing the increase in the base pay (of government and public sector employees) you are not making up for wages in the education system lagging behind those in other sectors,” Mihalinec said in a message to Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic.

He noted that until recently teachers had had the same status as social workers. “You have improved their status, we congratulate you on that, now it’s our turn,” the union leader said in a message to the government.

Mihalinec said that the rotating strike would last until November 1 and that the government had time until then to solve the problem that was the reason for teachers’ strike.