The National Chairman of the Executive Council of the Senior Staff Association -Universities of Ghana, Zakaria Mohammed has said that, government’s ‘unilateral decision’ not to increase salaries and wages of public sector workers until 2024 is not only shocking and worrying but very disappointing, frustrating and traumatizing to the Senior Staff cadre of Public Universities in Ghana.
He said, their agitation is not only an established fact, but also grounded in the industrial laws of the republic of Ghana that, salaries and wages are determined by Tripartite Committee and not solely by the government as it is the case he described as ‘unprecedented unilateral position unfortunately’ taken by government.
In a statement issued and signed by the National Chairman on behalf of the Council and sighted by a1radioonlin.com, it said, “assuming without admitting that, government is unable to push salaries and wages of public sector workers upwards for this year 2021, as a result of the ravaging corona virus situation that this country finds itself in, would it not have been possible for government to have engaged with National leadership of Unions in a stakeholder consultative meeting?”
It could be recalled that, the the Technical Adviser at the Ministry of Finance during a discussion on the 2021 budget organized by the Ghana National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GNCCI) disclosed that Public Sector workers looking forward to a huge wage increment will not get it because there is no money to meet such demands and this situation is likely to persist until 2024. He said, this is as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic and its impact on the economy, and that they should ‘tighten their belt’.
However, Mr. Zakaria among other issues, served notice to government that they are unbale to accept the responsibility of ‘belt tightening’ because the ‘belts’ of the Council have reached its elastic limits as a result of their condition of service which is supposed to be reviewed every two years, have been in arrears since 2008.
Source: A1Radioonline.com|101.1MHZ| James Nana Tsiquaye|Ghana
