Lecturers and other staff at University of Zimbabwe in Harare were poised to join their colleagues in Bulawayo, Gweru and Chinhoyi on strike Monday if the government did not respond to their salary demands by the close of business on Friday.
Instructors and other employees of institutions of higher learning in the three provincial cities went on strike earlier this week demanding pay increases of 1,200%.
Zimbabwe State Universities Academic Staff Association President Benjamin Njekeya said state university employees struck after talks with the government deadlocked.
Lecturers and staff at the National University of Science and Technology in Bulawayo, Gweru Midlands State University and Chinhoyi University of Technology, as well as the University of Zimbabwe, have rejected the 300 percent salary hike which the government offered all public employees at the beginning of the year.
State Universities Academic Staff Association Vice President James Mhlaule told reporter Carole Gombakomba of VOA's Studio 7 for Zimbabwe that his members are striking because Harare has continued to dismiss their grievances.