Hungarian Teachers Strike in Pre-Election Headache for Orban

(Bloomberg) -- Hungarian teachers staged their first strike in five years to protest low pay, a headache for Prime Minister Viktor Orban before the tightest general election in more than a decade.

More than 20,000 teachers walked out for two hours on Monday in what they described as a prelude to a complete and indefinite strike starting from March 16 unless they get paid more and their workloads are reduced. The government said less than a fifth of all teachers had suspended work.

The threat of further strikes threatens to complicate Orban's path to a fourth consecutive term in April 3 general elections. Orban's party and a six-faction alliance of opposition groups were tied in a Republikon poll published on Friday.

Orban's government, which tried to block the strike, said the work stoppage was “part of the left-wing's election campaign.” Zsuzsa Szabo, the head of the Teachers' Union, told reporters the protest was a “celebration of democracy” as teachers had to defy threats of retaliation from authorities. 

Hungarian primary school teachers receive the second-lowest wages -- less than $20,000 a year -- among 37 members in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, a study showed.

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