December the 7th, 2021 - The first Croatian teacher has lost their job at a school following their refusal to regularly test for the presence of the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, or be vaccinated against it. The recently introduced rules on the presentation of valid covid certificates to enter such a place of work has seen to it that their employment contract has been terminated.
As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, as the Bjelovar school principal Dario Malogorski confirmed to Jutarnji list, an agreement to terminate the employment contract of one Croatian teacher was signed with the employee in question on Monday. This was preceded by two warnings before their dismissal.
The individual in question is a younger Croatian teacher who became officially employed at the school on September the 1st this year. He told the school principal that he did not agree with the epidemiological measures against the spread of the novel coronavirus and that he did not agree to present any sort of covid certificates out of his own principles. Principal Malogorski points out that the Croatian teacher, not wanting to give the school any further problems, agreed to sign an amicable dismissal.
"The reason for the termination of this teacher's contract is their disagreement with the measures. I have to say that my colleague didn't make a scene, they didn't threaten anyone or anything, he simply didn't agree with the recently introduced measure about covid certificates and since its introduction he has never come to work,'' says Malogorski. During this time, classes for what would have been his students were organised through substite teachers, a job taken on by his colleagues.
Prior to the termination of the contract, the principal sent a warning to this Croatian teacher from Bjelovar on two occasions by mail before organising for their dismissal, but no return receipt arrived at the school, which means that the person didn't even bother to pick up their mail. Logically, given that a covid certificate is required to even enter the post office. The school principal therefore sent a few warnings via e-mail. He didn't receive a statement from this member of staff on those previously issued warnings either.
"We spoke on Thursday and Friday, and the teacher agreed to the agreed upon dismissal, which means that we have no claims against each other. In this situation, this is the best solution. I can't go into his principles, but I emphasise, my colleague behaved totally fairly, except that they didn't come to class to teach their students, so we had to organise replacements,'' concluded the school's principal.
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