The President of the Greater Accra branch of the National Association of Graduate Teachers [NAGRAT] has stated that the strike action embarked on by members of the Greater Accra branch of NAGRAT will be intensified since government failed to address their concerns at a meeting held yesterday.

Speaking via phone on Adom TV’s BADWAM show on Multi TV, Patrick Agboryibor stated that “what I have heard is that, the arrears that the government owes us are going to be paid over a four-year period. This is uncalled for and I have not heard such a thing anywhere. Do we use four years to pay arrears?”

According to him, the decision by government to settle the Single Spine Salary arrears over a 4-year period indicates that government is not serious about teachers and as such takes them for granted.

The Greater Accra NAGRAT President indicated that the Association will continue with its strike action until its demands are met by government.

He was optimistic the strike action by the Greater Accra branch of NAGRAT will be replicated across the country since NAGRAT members in the Eastern region have also called for a strike.

Commenting on why some members of the association are still at post when a strike has been declared, Mr. Agboryibor indicated that the association has communicated very well to all its members to stay out of the classroom and is expecting them to do so.

National Women’s Organizer of the New Patriotic Party, Otiko Djaba who was also a guest on the show noted that the recent labour unrests in the country stem from government’s failure to educate the masses on the implementation of the Single Spine Salary Structure.

According to her, the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission did not put in place a comprehensive communication structure to educate the beneficiaries of the pay policy before implementing it – a situation she noted has led to the recent impasse.

“The government rushed to implement single spine without properly studying how to go about the implementation… The structure was designed to fail from the beginning because of the lack of time for them to interrogate the thing properly” Ms. Djaba added.


Source: Ewurabena Yorke/ Multi TV