AS a country we should be worried about the growing agitation, especially on the labour front. And to put it bluntly these labour agitations do not bode well for us as a developing nation. We on Today admit this is not the first time Ghana is experiencing such strikes by various labour unions, but it is disquieting when the same labour unions agitate periodically and then many of them do so one after the other in such a short time.
FIRST, it was our doctors who raised issues with the treatment they have received under the Single-Spine Salary Structure (SSSS.) As we write, their issues are yet to be addressed and solutions found to them. However, since they have been given assurances, our hardworking doctors have called off the strike, especially because various civil society groups appealed to them to exercise patience.
THEN the strike by Ghana National Teachers Association (GNAT,) National Association of Graduate Teachers (NAGRAT,) Teachers and Educational Workers Union (TEWU) and Concerned Teachers Association of Ghana (CTAG) also hit the headlines. As in the case of our doctors, it took an intervention by the president before our teachers returned to the classroom after two weeks outside it. Also in that case they were merely given the assurance that the issues will be dealt with.
THEN when we thought the dust was about settling on strikes the University Teachers Association of Ghana (UTAG) announced earlier this week that it has asked its members to embark on strike to protest delays in the payment of their 2012 market premiums. The UTAG sound very serious and have taken an entrenched position that until government pays them their full arrears they will remain out the lecture halls.
INASMUCH as we appreciate government?s efforts in dealing with the current labour unrests, we at Today must state in clear terms that the Mahama administration has failed to live up to its responsibilities. We state so, because for one thing, the administration cannot pretend it is unaware, for instance, of the arrears owed our university lecturers, teachers and doctors.
AND according to the President of UTAG, Anthony Simmons, they have been over this matter more than once with the Fair Wages and Salary Commission (FWSC) and national administration, but there has been very little goodwill let alone solutions (payment) from the other side. In fact from what Mr. Simmons said, national administration actually reneged on promises it made to UTAG in the past.
That is bad, very bad indeed!
SECONDLY, it appears national administrations dilly-dally with issues of labour unrests. Instead of tackling the labour agitation issues head on to prevent a recurrence, they come to the unions with promises they know they would not keep and window-dressing proposals. The consequences is accumulating arrears owed to UTAG, other teachers, doctors, other public workers, then when the economic situation begins to bite (because of the administration?s incompetence) the labour agitation begin all over again. In other words, if, for instance, national administration had fully dealt with the case of the UTAG arrears when it arose some time back, we will not be having this strike.
THREE, the administration cannot claim to be unaware of all the problems created by the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission (FWSC) in transferring groups of workers onto the SSSS. Hence last week, there were rumours that even staff of the Fire Service were threatening to go on strike over similar matters. Until all those issues are all dealt with the strikes will continue.
INDEED, we on Today are shocked over how we never learn in this country. This is not the first time Ghana is introducing a new pay policy for public workers, but it is obvious that the same fundamental problems that beset the last ones are the same ones bedeviling the SSSS. How come and why?
IT is against this backdrop that we at Today urge government to expedite action on the various labour agitations that have cropped up and solve them to the bottom of the barrel to prevent their recurrence.
