Prince Obeng Hema
The Colleges of Education Teachers Association of Ghana (CETAG) has begun a nationwide strike from Tuesday, August 1, 2023 over government refusal to implement negotiated allowances and payment of basic salary based on their salary grade.
A statement issued and signed July 10, 2023 by its National President, Prince Obeng Hema and Secretary, Thomas Ampomah said the strike was necessitated by the refusal by the Ministry of Finance (MoF) to act on Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC) letter together with the National Labour Commission’s (NLC) arbitral orders requesting immediate implementation of negotiated agreement.
“The leadership of the Colleges of Education Teachers Association of Ghana (CETAG), wishes to serve notice of our intention to withdraw our services across the 46 public Colleges of Education effective Tuesday, August 1, 2023. If by Monday, July 31, the government has not implemented our negotiated allowances of one off-payment of one month’s basic salary based on CETAG’s salary grade in compensation for additional duty performed in 2022 payable to tutors per the NLC’s arbitral award ORDER given on May 2, 2023,” the statement disclosed.
Background
In January, teachers at the 46 Colleges of Education across the country embarked on an indefinite strike after the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission protracted negotiations for new conditions of service for more than a year.
The industrial action was eventually called off following interventions by the National Labour Commission, which subsequently saw the introduction of compulsory arbitral orders for new conditions of service for CETAG.
“Following the NLC’s compulsory Arbitral Award, the parties proceeded to sign off the negotiation agreement which has been communicated to the Ministry of Finance by the FWSC since May 26, 2023 for approval and implementation,” the statement read.
According to the Association, the Ministry of Finance has ‘deliberately prolonged’ implementations of the agreements between the teachers and the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission.
“Surprisingly, the MoF has refused to act on FWSC’s letter together with the NLC’s Arbitral ORDERS in spite of letters to the MoF requesting immediate implementation of the negotiated agreements. Practically, CETAG members cannot continue to survive on expired 2020 conditions of service (CoS) in this biting economy of Ghana,” the statement read.
It further stated that, CETAG will revert to its old system from the beginning of the 2023/2024 academic year to enable them take inter-semester vacations, describing the all-year-round academic calendar as “killer”.
“The practice is softly killing tutors. Leadership is calling on stakeholders to adopt the in-out-out-in system to let all cohorts of students remain in school and complete the academic year together to enable tutors take inter-semester break. After all, no law says all tertiary students should be accommodated on campus,” the statement read.
By Ebenezer K. Amponsah